The Mourner
by Daphne Dunham
Summary: Surviving the Second War is the last thing Severus Snape expects—or even wants… until a child enters his life and helps him learn to live again.
1. Chapter 1: The Return of the Phoenix

**The Mourner**  
By Daphne Dunham

_A child, more than all other gifts  
That earth can offer to declining man,  
Brings hope with it, and forward-looking thoughts.  
_- Wordsworth

* * *

_**Chapter 1: The Return of the Phoenix**_

Those first few hours are hazy—misty moments of wavering consciousness in which he isn't really quite sure of where he is or why. He knows there is the rain: Through his quivering lashes, he can see it falling hard, its thick, heavy drops splashing against the hospital wing windows overhead like great, gray tears. And there is the taste in his mouth: the acrid allusion to copious amounts of Blood-Replenishing Potion lingering beneath the dryness of his throat and tongue. But mostly there are the sounds, ever present, whether he's dreaming or awake. There is whispering—brief words of remedy and reassurance, phrases like "drink that draft down" and "there, that's looking much better now, isn't it?" And there is shuffling, footsteps across stone floors, sometimes rushing, other times painfully slow, like a cripple regaining his stride. All are punctuated by the occasional groan or gasp or sigh. It's like a symphony of suffering.

There is ache in every millimeter of his body—from the tips of his toes to the lank, greasy strands of dark hair at his scalp. And he is weak, so much so that opening his eyes is a labor; that he is exhausted from lifting his head off the pillow; and that accepting the tea proffered, sip by sip, by the nurse hovering over him is nothing short of a feat. He is relieved when she sets the cup aside and readjusts the pillows beneath him to help him lie back down.

"Thank you, Madam Pomfrey," he tells her; his voice is slightly hoarse from disuse and his tone is somewhat grudging, emitted through gritted teeth. Severus Snape is not, after all, accustomed to being so helpless. It simultaneously annoys him, infuriates him, demoralizes him.

Madam Pomfrey nods in polite acknowledgment but does not have the time to linger in conversation with the hospital so full—not that she expects Severus would want her to. Instead, she turns to the table beside his hospital bed, to the tray of phials she's been carrying with her on her rounds. "A bit of Morphia Maxima should help for now," she reassures him as she tips a drop of potion into his mouth. The liquid is mild and slightly sweet, like melon, and it feels warm as it drips down Severus' throat, easing the dull pain in his body as it trickles through him, head to foot.

"Please do rest, headmaster," Madam Pomfrey adds as she steps back and away.

Headmaster. He tosses the term over in his mind, hazily yet distinctly sardonically. Considering his abrupt departure from the school the night of the attack—however long ago that had been, he is unsure—Severus has assumed that he no longer has the right to be called by that title. Apparently, he thinks bitterly despite his half-stupor, the drama of Battle has left the Hogwarts community without its flair for circulating rumor faster than a Cruciatus Curse from Alecto Carrow's wand. Headmaster.

It's his final thought before the Morphia Maxima takes full effect and he closes his eyes once again, lulled by sleep and the symphony of suffering.

**----------- **

"Severus—oh, thank Merlin he's all right. This way, Poppy? Oh, thank you."

It's evening—that evening. Candles are just being lit across the hospital wing, casting lazy shadows on the castle walls. And it is quieter, patients slowly dropping off to sleep, the louder ones with the aid of medication. Severus hears the familiar Scottish inflection before he sees her, her voice carrying well across the wing in its increased stillness. Abandoning his vague meditation on the crevices and corners of the ceilings, Severus struggles to try to sit up a bit—to restore some semblance of his dignity before being forced to confront her.

"Professor," he nods in recognition to Minerva McGonagall as she steps behind the pale blue curtain shielding him from the other patients. His greeting is terse, perfunctory, unmoved and unemotional.

"Poppy told me you had woken up at last," she explains. Surprisingly, there is marked relief in her voice and caring concern in her face as she stands beside his bed—quite different from her demeanor the last time they had met, when she had driven him from the school in fury. "I came as quickly as I could."

Severus shifts uncomfortably under Minerva's gaze. He's endured a full year of her sniping, of her skepticism, of her not-so-subtle attempts to undermine his every move. All the while he knew, of course, that her clear mistrust of him and antipathy toward him, prompted quite obviously by his hand Albus Dumbledore's death and Harry Potter's rendition of it, meant he was fulfilling his role—and doing so quite convincingly. While this knowledge was reassuring, it was simultaneously disconcerting to know that he had no allies—no one to trust—within the castle walls. And when Minerva, flanked by Flitwick and Sprout, had attacked him, he had known his efforts had run their course.

Now, she is looking at him with eyes flooded with remorse and—he hates the thought of it—sympathy. Severus can only assume this means one thing: Potter spoke. He told her—if not everyone else—of the truth regarding his loyalties, of everything he saw in those memories Severus had hemorrhaged along with the blood from his jugular in the Shrieking Shack. Severus cringes at the thought of it, of having his most private—his most intimate—memories spilled to the masses as casually as pumpkin juice at a dinner table. When he'd given Harry those moments from his past, he hadn't expected to survive… which makes him wonder: How and why is he now stretched in the hospital wing with Minerva McGonagall hovering over him and—Severus moves stiffly as he tries to sit and reaches up to feel it—his neck wrapped in bandages?

"They found you," Minerva tells him, sensing his puzzlement. "In the Shack. You-Know-Who gave us the chance to gather our dead and wounded. You were unconscious, weak. You'd lost so much blood we didn't think you'd make it. Do you remember?"

With great difficulty, Severus gives a terse nod of the head. "Of course I remember," he says quietly, bitterly. It seems a foolish idea to him that he could possibly forget nearly dying, that he could fail to recall how Voldemort had callously betrayed him, set Nagini upon him and abandoned him for dead—all for a power he didn't understand, couldn't understand. It wasn't the first time the Dark Lord had betrayed Severus; the hook-nosed wizard had learned many years ago—the night he killed Lily Potter—that Voldemort would forsake anyone. The attempt on his life was not, therefore, a surprise to Severus. In fact, it was something he had expected; the only surprise had been how long it had taken Voldemort to decide to do it.

"They found you with this…." Minerva adds. She withdraws from a pocket hidden in the folds of her robes something long and thin, wispy, and golden: the tail feather of a phoenix. She sets it on the bed beside Severus, a peace offering of sorts. "It would seem as though someone has been looking out for you."

"Fawkes…" Severus' voice sounds far away to him, like an echo in a cave.

In truth, he has never particularly cared for the bird; animals never managed to evoke sentimentality or affection in him, as they do for Hagrid—or did for Dumbledore, where his phoenix was concerned. However, the knowledge that Fawkes had returned to him in the Shack—that the bird's tears had defused Nagini's poison and saved his life—stirs a softness in him, a kind sentimentality he hasn't felt in years. With a weak and slightly trembling hand, Severus reaches out for the feather; he turns it over in his fingers with awe and appreciation. Despite his many faults, Albus Dumbledore hadn't used and betrayed him, he realizes: Only the late headmaster could have arranged for Fawkes to keep quiet watch over Severus, his friend, his successor, his loyal soldier; only the late headmaster could have prepared for and planned to protect him like this.

"Albus very much thought of you as a son, I think," Minerva says, also aware of the truth in the meaning of Fawkes' return.

Severus looks up at her sharply. "And he was very much like a father to me," he replies fiercely. His dark eyes flash dangerously, warning her against any insinuation to contradict him. Despite how it may have appeared to her, after all, spending the better part of the last year in the office of the man he'd agreed to murder—of whose power he was forced to usurp, of whose influence over his life was much more meaningful and valued than Tobias Snape's ever was—has been nothing short of torment.

Appreciating the difficulty of Severus' situation now, the Head of Gryffindor House nods sadly, guiltily. "You must understand that it was a great shock to us when… when Albus died," she tells him. Then, she places her hand gently on Severus' arm, a gesture tantamount to a warm embrace in the emotional lexicon of the prim and proper Minerva McGonagall. The hook-nosed wizard looks down at her thin fingers on his hospital robes as though they are something foreign. "I owe you an apology, Severus," she adds in a quiet, abashed tone.

No further words are needed: Both know without clarification to what she refers—to everything that she has done to him this past year, starting with her blind belief in Harry Potter's rendition of Dumbledore's death and culminating in her leading the other Heads in an attack against him the night of the Battle of Hogwarts. But despite her remorse, Severus is silent a moment, unmoved.

"No apology is necessary, Professor McGonagall," he informs her tersely. And his words are true: Albus Dumbledore's opinion has been the only one that has mattered to him for so long that he has grown immune to anyone else's scorn. Minerva's contempt has been irrelevant to him on a personal level, although it has made his work this past year—delicately balancing the school as it teetered precariously on the verge of plunging irrevocably between the proverbial good and evil—that much harder. Still, her apology is both unwanted and unneeded.

Minerva withdraws her hand and nods in tacit comprehension. Even if she hadn't understood Severus' feelings on this matter, she can't say she'd blame him for refusing her apology—if for no other reason, her actions show her lack of faith in Albus Dumbledore's good judgment: In her revolution against Snape, whom the late headmaster had quite vocally placed an enormous amount of trust, Minerva betrayed her confidence in the great man she'd claimed to admire and support so much. Her transgression has been not only against the dark-haired wizard before her but, most significantly, against Dumbledore as well.

"And Potter?" Severus asks at last, changing the uncomfortable subject of his bond with the late headmaster and focusing instead on a matter that concerns him even more, a matter that he has dedicated the last sixteen years of his life to and nearly paid with his life for. He is trying to mask the hesitation in his tone, but if there is one thing left in this world that he dreads, it is the answer Minerva might provide. "What has become of him?"

A rare grin, proud and pleased, spreads across Minerva's thin lips; not only is she grateful for the opportunity to speak of something else, but she is keen to share the good news. "He did Gryffindor well, Potter did," she replies.

Severus raises his eyebrows, annoyed with her vague response and pressing for more details. "Then the Dark Lord is…?"

"Well, he's dead, naturally," Minerva says, as if it's only the most obvious outcome of Harry Potter's skill and bravery.

For Minerva McGonagall, the defeat of Voldemort in the hands of Harry Potter may have seemed so logical it should be deemed inherently obvious—self-evident, like the fact that the sun will rise tomorrow. For Severus Snape, though, the outcome is substantially more of a surprise. He may have spent the last umpteen years attempting to protect Lily Evans' son, but that doesn't necessarily mean that he has ever had the utmost faith in the boy's magical abilities. The truth is quite the contrary, really; Harry's inconsistent performance in Potions and lamentable attempt at Occlumency have given Severus good reason to find him merely mediocre.

Minerva doesn't miss the opportunity to look at him with an air of triumph, as if their Gryffindor-Slytherin rivalry of years past has been resurrected and the House Cup up for grabs once more. She speaks spiritedly of all that has transpired since Severus was wounded: of the way Hagrid carried what they presumed was Harry Potter's corpse up to the castle and of how she dueled Voldemort himself in the Great Hall, of Harry's daring showdown with the Dark Lord and of the hubris that proved to be the latter's downfall. Minerva speaks of the losses on both sides of the battle, some sadly, others not: Fred Weasley, Bellatrix Lestrange. And she speaks—with a bit of sentimentality—about the damage sustained by Hogwarts castle itself.

"Fortunately, we've already begun to rebuild," she tells him. "We've had tremendous support from the students and parents, of course—and the Ministry."

Once more, Severus raises his eyebrows in cynicism. The Ministry, last he had known, was thoroughly corrupt and less than supportive of running the school the way it ought to be run—the way Dumbledore would have run it.

"Minister Shacklebolt is proving positively revolutionary," Minerva explains, seeing his reaction. She pauses then and clears her throat. "I'm sure that you, as headmaster, will be pleased to know that we should have the repairs complete in time for the start of the new school year," she adds.

Startled at the repeated reference to himself as headmaster, Severus looks up at the aging witch before him. He finds her peering weightily down at him. It reminds him of the way Dumbledore used to look at him when he expected something of him, when there was a complicated decision at hand and the right choice was difficult but needed to be made snonetheless. In Minerva's eyes, though, Severus also sees a memory: her reaction to a girl's question shouted across the Hall; he sees the words forming on her lips: Professor Snape has done a bunk. It makes his lips curl in indignation.

"As you are well aware, Professor McGonagall," he says coldly, his voice barely more than a whisper, "I am no longer headmaster of Hogwarts."

But Minerva is insistent. "Severus, I am positive that the Board will be more than happy to reinstate your position," she begins to argue. "The school already accepts you as the rightful headmaster—and we need a strong leader, especially now."

"Then shall I tender my official resignation to you, as Deputy Headmistress, or to the Board?" he persists with increased annoyance.

"Severus, I don't understa—"

"There is nothing to understand," he says. His voice is soft, but his tone is strong, a sense of finality deep within it.

Looking bewildered, Minerva closes her mouth abruptly and takes a step backwards. Severus doesn't really expect her to appreciate his decision: She lives to teach, to sculpt young boys and girls into fine wizards and witches. Severus, however, does not. He has treasured academics, and yet he doesn't enjoy his students—too much whining from the little ones, too much frustration with the dim-witted ones, not enough appreciation from the intelligent ones. He has wanted power, and yet the method by which he had become headmaster seems dishonorable to him—insulting, even—too much reliance on blackmail and murder, rather than on his own merit. He has wanted eminence, and yet the reputation he has been forced to maintain inside these castle walls—especially this past year—is unfavorable, unjust, and would be too arduous to overcome.

"What will you do now then, Severus?" Minerva asks him quietly at last.

The dark-haired wizard hesitates a moment. It's difficult for him to imagine what he can do, where he can go. For so many years, Hogwarts has been Severus' home. Even before coming here as a boy, it was a beacon of hope—a refuge, and its status as such has certainly not diminished over the years but grown even stronger. Leaving, however, is inevitable now after all that has happened, especially this past year: after watching Dumbledore's body fall back, lifeless, over the ramparts of Astronomy Tower; after having to allow the Carrows to practice their sadism in these halls, on the students; after now declining the opportunity to resume his post.

Spinner's End is out of the question; Severus has always hated it there. London is too hectic for his taste; he's had enough chaos for a lifetime. And Godric's Hollow would be too painful; it would drive him mad to be so close to Lily's grave, to see the shambles of her home each day. Yet it is out of these thoughts that Severus stumbles across the answer to Minerva's question. His life has been plagued, and for nearly two decades he has not even had the ability to realize it—to absorb it. He has not had the time enough or been at peace enough to come to terms with all the loss—with Lily, with Dumbledore, with his mistakes. Now, at long last, he does.

"Mourn," Severus replies simply.

**----------- **

The letter from the Board comes, as Minerva McGonagall has predicted, while Severus is packing the last of his trunks. He doesn't bother to open it; he already knows what it says: unanimous agreement… valor… valued experience… please reconsider resuming…. Abandoned, it sits on the small table by the plush, emerald green chaise in his sitting room. He casts it a sideways glance as he tucks the last of his possessions into his robes: The torn picture of Lily and the last page of her letter to Sirius resume their rightful place close to his heart, close to his soul. He takes a final look around the room, then, finding it satisfactorily divested of his personal belongings, reaches reluctantly for the letter on the table. He turns it over in his hand, toying with the seal a moment before turning it back once more with even firmer resolve. He reads his name across it for a final time: _Severus Snape, Headmaster, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry._

Moments later, the gate slams closed behind Severus with a definitive clank as he turns to leave the school—no farewells, no melodrama, just the way he wishes. And deep in the bowels of the castle, in a fireplace in the dungeons he had once made his own personal prison, the letter addressed to Headmaster Snape smolders, crumbled, smoking into nothingness like a cloud, like a ghost.

* * *

_A/N: I gratefully acknowledge that this story is loosely based on George Eliot's _Silas Marner_. To be continued… _


	2. Chapter 2: The Bravest Man He Ever Knew

**The Mourner**

By Daphne Dunham

_A child, more than all other gifts  
That earth can offer to declining man,  
Brings hope with it, and forward-looking thoughts.  
_--Wordsworth

* * *

_**Chapter 2: The Bravest Man He Ever Knew**_

* * *

"Well go on, Silas—do it," prods the stout boy impatiently. 

The boy called Silas stares at the twig in his hand in disbelief, as if it is an alien thing, a hateful thing, a Dark thing. He closes his eyes a moment, hoping that he'll somehow be able to blink the stick away. However, his heart thumps heavier in his chest when he opens his eyes once more: No such luck; the twig is still there. He swallows hard and glances around at the contents of the palms of the four other boys hovering around him, hoping that he is somehow mistaken, but he is not: He's done it this time—he's drawn the shortest twig.

"I _triple _troll dare you," the larger boy challenges further, his eyes narrowing to smug slits as he folds his arms across his chest.

At the mention of a triple troll dare, the mood intensifies. There are wide eyes all around the circle, the boys exchanging awed, horrified glances with one another before fixing their stares on Silas. The latter glances anxiously over his shoulder. For weeks, he's partaken of this Friday afternoon ritual—the lingering at the roadside in front of the small, strange cottage, drawing lots to see whose turn it would be to venture up that long, overgrown walkway. Silas has watched his friends one-by-one fall victim to the luck of the twigs—first Godfrey, most recently William. Each has had varying degrees of success: Dunstan achieving the most, having made it as far as the dilapidated crab apple tree by the door before becoming too frightened to go further. He'd managed to inflict his damage, nonetheless—hurled a nearby stone through the dusty window, shattering the glass, before racing away back down the hill, back down the walkway to the safety of the street. Indeed, Dunstan's accomplishment has been a fine one, the model to which they have all aspired; surpassing it seems nearly impossible to Silas.

"Ease up, Eliot—I'm going," Silas snaps, turning back to the group.

With a pretense of cool self-assurance, he thrusts the tiny twig back at Eliot. Then, wiping his palms, sweaty with anxiety, on the sides of his robes, Silas turns away from his friends. Suppressing a nervous sigh, he starts up the walkway, the hesitancy in his stride betraying his lack of confidence. Even several steps up the path, he can still hear the snickering from the group of boys he's left behind him on the roadside.

"Bet you five knuts that he runs away before he even reaches the door," William says.

"A sickle for him wetting himself when he sees Master Snape," chimes in Bryce.

"_Two _sickles Snape cuts him up and boils him in his cauldron," adds the significantly more malicious Dunstan.

Then, Silas hears nothing—just his heart beating wildly and the crunch of his footsteps on the dust and gravel of the narrow, winding walkway. It's a precarious path—steep and weedy, with roots and rocks protruding from beneath, waiting to ensnare. Silas trips over a decaying log; it crumbles from the force of his kick, moldy wood and ants spewing from it like vomit. He makes a feeble attempt to catch himself as he falls but only finds himself sprawled, face-down on the front step of the cottage at the top of the hill. Dusting dirt off his robes and trying to ignore the sting of the scrapes on his hands, the boy stands up, trembling.

Silas has lived in Hogsmeade his entire life and cannot recall a time when Raveloe Cottage has looked any different than it does now. A Tudor-style arrangement of rooms with an irregular roofline hovering in the shadows of Hogwarts castle, it smacks of peculiarity and disuse. The lawn looks as though it hasn't been cut in months; several shingles are missing, and much of the timber looks splintered. Even the window Dunstan had broken weeks ago is still in a state of disrepair. The only signs of life, in fact, come from the chimney, which smokes lazily—and the hothouse, partly shielded by the crab apple tree on the side of the property and apparently the home of some rare and menacing-looking plants.

Despite the fact that it has been many months since the peculiar man rumored to be Master Snape has come to live here, there has been little, if any, progress made in improving the property. The man's reluctance to be seen in town—despite the fact that he is said to be single-handedly responsible for keeping Applewither's Apothecary well stocked for the aging proprietor—has only added to the mystery of his existence. And the fact that he is rumored to have gone slightly mad since the War has made him a target of schoolboys' fear and mischief.

It is that same fear and mischief which fills Silas now. He takes a deep breath in attempt to calm himself as he stares at the weather-beaten wooden door before him. He knows his mother has told him numerous times to leave poor Master Snape—if indeed it _is_ him—alone, that he's a hero who has earned his peace, even if he does choose to live it out in a strange fashion. But his friends are on the street below watching, daring, betting against him. He can practically hear Dunstan mocking his cowardice and gloating how _he_ is still the bravest of them all, having ventured the farthest into the domain of the recluse. Hand trembling, Silas reaches out toward the door. He knocks on it quickly, pounding his fist against it urgently; then he dashes away behind the corner of the house, barely breathing.

A moment later, the cottage door opens with a creak. A sallow, hook-nosed man peers around the frame of the door. He's frowning, dour-faced, as he scans the yard to see who has summoned him. Finding no one outside, the man mutters something incoherent yet distinctly irritated under his breath, then disappears back inside and slams the door closed once more. Silas waits a few moments, then repeats the process again: emerges from around the corner of the house, knocks, hides, and waits—and again, the pale man opens the door, surveys his stoop, and grumpily stalks back inside. The third time he does it, Silas can hear the giggles rising up the hill from the boys watching at the roadside as he takes his place out of sight by the side of the house. He hears the man open the door, then waits for the swearing and the slamming that follows. It's taking longer than usual this time. Curious, he steps out of the shadows, wondering what the cause of the change in ritual could be.

"So we think we are _amusing_ do we?" seethes a cold, silky voice suddenly.

There is a jolt in which Silas barely realizes what is happening—he's only sure that there is a rough hand at his neck, pushing him forward, toward the path and off the property. Terrified, the boy kicks and cries against his captor, struggling to free himself.

"Never show your face here again!" Each syllable is punctuated with ice. Then, the man abruptly lets go, thrusting the intruder away with such force that the boy trips and stumbles over the same decaying log he had encountered on his way up the hill.

Silas scrambles to his feet, panting insipid apologies. "I'm sorry—I'm sorry—didn't—mean—any—harm!"

But as he races away, he doesn't dare look back at the man to see if he is the same person he'd seen on the front page of the _Daily Prophet_—he doesn't care if he accomplishes the task he'd set out to do. Instead, Silas can only think of the safety to be obtained by reaching the roadside and how grateful he'll be when this encounter becomes nothing but a memory he'll laugh at over an icy glass of pumpkin juice with his friends.

- - -

With a sudden pop, Harry Potter finds himself standing in front of the crooked, wooden sign. The paint is chipped slightly, but the words are clear enough: Raveloe Cottage. He pauses, skeptical, as he stares up the gnarled path, up the hill, up to the strange Tudor home above. It had probably once been a charming place, this cottage, he thinks—all it needs is some straightening up. And some weeding. And a garden—lilies, perhaps, would be fitting. Either way, it seems like an unlikely home for a hero. Then, Harry glances down the road, where a pack of pre-adolescent boys are laughing and slapping the skinniest among them on the back in a congratulatory fashion; they walk away quickly, back toward the village. At once, Harry is sure he's at the right place. 

"No…" Harry whispers to himself, his heart suddenly heavy. He thinks of a memory that isn't his—that he had witnessed in a Pensieve three years ago: Snape's worst memory—the way his father, flanked by his friends, had tormented the stringy, greasy-haired young Snape after O.W.L.s. Now, the scene of a gang of boys walking away from the adult Snape with laughter and haughty airs evokes similar visions in Harry's mind, and at once, the young man can guess what has happened here, what those boys must have been doing in such an otherwise secluded area of Hogsmeade.

"Oi!" he calls after them, planning to shout, to scold, to tell them who it is that they're harassing: a former Death Eater, a former spy, a former Hogwarts headmaster—the bravest man Harry Potter himself has ever met. And respect is most certainly in order. But it's too late. The pack have made their way out of hearing distance, have disappeared around a bend in the road, and Harry can only shake his head slowly and turn back to the forlorn Raveloe Cottage with a sigh. It never ends for Snape, he thinks sadly.

As he starts up the tangled walkway to the house dangling precariously on the hill above, there is a heaviness in his heart—a melancholic empathy that just mere months ago, Harry never imagined he could feel for the cold, cruel man who had been his professor. Even as he walks, a part of him doesn't believe he's doing this—never thought he actually would find himself _wanting_ to talk to Severus Snape. However, as Harry raises his hand and knocks on the door, he can scarcely wait for the hook-nosed wizard he had once loathed to appear on the other side and let him in.

There's no answer at first, even though Harry feels quite certain he sees a shifting light through the dusky window—candles or the flames of a cauldron. Only when he lifts his hand and knocks again—more forcefully this time, nearly getting a splinter in his knuckles—does he receive a response.

"I _told _you never to show your face around here again," hisses a voice from within the cottage.

Harry hesitates, his suspicions regarding the boys on the roadside seemingly confirmed. He persists, though, knocking on the door again in courtesy. "Professor?" he says as his hand finds the knob. He turns it slowly.

Very narrowly, Harry misses it: the beaker hurtling through the air toward him, aimed fairly well at the center of his head—a gift intended for one of the nuisance boys he'd seen on the way here, he assumes. He ducks, and the vial soars over him, smashing on the now-ajar doorframe in a torrent of glass. It's not the first time he's had Snape's potion-making equipment hurled at him, and Harry moves forward cautiously. He peers around the door to see his attacker; his trainers make crunching sounds as he walks, the glass underfoot grinding into the wooden floor with each step. "Professor?" he repeats.

The central living space of the cottage is mostly open, one room divided into many purposes. In the corner is a small kitchenette, tidy except for the dusty remains of a broken window sitting on the floor in front of the sink; across from it is a fireplace, flames blazing at the hearth, dancing happily over the logs with a mirth the rest of the area does not exude. There is the tiny sitting area nestled in front of the fire, complete with a matching sofa and wingback chair and guarded by a swarm of brimming bookshelves. Tucked in the far corner is a staircase, some spindles missing; it must lead upstairs—to a bedroom or two, perhaps. Finally, in the center of the room—a midpoint between the fire and the doorway and the stairs—is a workstation, a long wooden table on which there seems to be all manner of things Harry remembers seeing in Snape's Potions classroom: vials and beakers, liquids and slimes, fleshy specimens in flasks. And, nestled in the center of it all, a cauldron.

Severus Snape stands at the workstation, his black-clad figure hovering over it like a bat, like a grim reaper. He looks up sharply at the intruder, his dark eyes flickering dangerously. He had known Harry would come to see him—maybe not today, of course—but eventually. After all, Severus had gotten the boy's letters; they arrived nearly every week, bearing with them the usual inane news and questions: Harry was going back to school, and wouldn't he reconsider doing the same? Harry wanted to talk to him about his parents; couldn't his former professor please spare a bit of time? The Ministry was holding a ceremony to honor the dead and the heroes of the Battle of Hogwarts; would Severus be attending? It seemed only a matter of time before Harry gave up on relying on unanswered letters and came in person instead.

"Potter," Severus says tersely in greeting, sizing the boy—the young man, rather—up. He can't say he's particularly pleased to see his former student: arrogantly strutting through his front door uninvited, as though expecting to be closely connected, their history together conveniently forgotten in a sudden wave of sentimentality.

For a moment, all the two wizards do is stare at one another: Severus at Harry and Harry at Severus. For Harry, it is like he is looking at the sallow-skinned, hook-nosed wizard for another first time, a first time very different from the day he'd spotted him at the staff table before his Sorting when he started at Hogwarts. Those cavernous eyes, greasy curtains of hair, and thin frame are not so dissimilar from his, Harry realizes. After all, the two of them have so much in common: the loss, the suffering, the marginalization, the love, the bravery. They are not so unalike as he had once wanted them to be, he and Snape—Harry sees this now.

There is so much to say that the words Harry has been planning suddenly seem inadequate; they pour over him in a deluge of regret, rendering him speechless. Harry wants to apologize for the years of fury and wrongs—he wants to ask Snape about his mother—he wants to tell him about his conversation with Dumbledore at King's Cross, that the headmaster expressed remorse for what happened to him. Mostly, though, Harry wants to tell him that he's grateful, wants to thank Snape for his selflessness, his courage, the depths of which he can only begin to fathom.

"I'm not talking about Lily, and you would be wise not to ask," Severus says finally, coldly, sensing—as always—Harry's thoughts and intentions. Severus' voice seems to carry on the mist rising from the cauldron before him. Then, with a wave of his wand, the steam vanishes and the fire beneath it is extinguished; the cauldron is empty.

Harry's face falls slightly, disappointed. He watches, trying to recover, as Severus crosses the room and sits, back to him, by the fire. The older wizard's air is impassive, and he avoids looking at Harry; it's as though the young man is something unsightly. Nonetheless, Harry steps forward, emboldened by the fact that there have been no more objects hurled at him and no insistence that he leave. He moves closer to the fire, closer to Severus—though not brazen enough to sit beside him.

"I was hoping you'd have attended the ceremony at the Ministry this afternoon," Harry tells him. "Didn't you receive the invitation—or any of my letters?"

"I did," Severus replies simply.

Harry struggles against his already mounting exasperation; he doesn't want to loathe Severus Snape anymore. "And…?" he prompts.

"And nothing," Severus informs him. "I received the letters—" He pauses to nod in the direction of the fireplace, toward an intricately carved rectangular wooden box that lies on the mantle. "—However, they were nothing of consequence to me."

Color floods Harry's cheeks at the implication of the Potions Master's words—and a bit of the familiar bile he's used to experiencing in Severus' company is threatening to rise in him once more: As he looks toward the box, he sees an envelope—still unopened, unread—sitting on top of it, waiting to accompany its brothers within. Harry recognizes the seal on the fold: _HJP _pressed into Gryffindor-crimson wax; it's his own seal—his own letter, the one he'd sent yesterday.

"Those letters are of every consequence to you," Harry blurts, almost accusatorily, at the revelation. He stops speaking abruptly, then tries to swallow the bile and force calm on himself. "You can't shut the world out," he adds. There's an urgent, almost begging quality to his tone.

"Yes, what a great pity it would be if I did," Severus snaps. "The wizarding community would certainly be lost if not for my great contributions to it."

The words hang acridly in the air, leaving Harry open-mouthed, stunned. It's an ironic choice of words for a man who has just been awarded the highest honor possible in the wizarding world—even if he refused to receive his medal in person. "I think the Ministry feels differently, Professor," he says.

The firelight glints off the medal as Harry withdraws it from his trousers' pocket. For the first time, Severus looks up, looks at him. He takes the proffered token, turning it over in his hand. The medal is cold to the touch, hard—a harsh conflict in textures when compared to the vine of rich, soft, navy velvet looped through the tiny hole at its top. Severus runs his finger over the engraving of the famous ancient wizard's likeness, then reads its inscription slowly. _Order of Merlin, First Class. Severus T. Snape. For valor, wisdom, and skill in the face of danger._

"I accepted it on your behalf at the ceremony today," Harry explains. "I thought you might like to keep it."

An iceberg—a frozen, impassible mass—blockades Severus' throat as he looks at the medal. Then, his eyes grow steely and cold, like iron. And his face whitens, pale and sour like old milk—and his body tenses, jaw to joints, rigid, uncomfortable. Another man may have treasured this honor, but to Severus Snape, the medal is nothing more than a reminder of the horrors he has seen and done, of his mistakes and his repentance. He doesn't see Merlin's face in the medal, doesn't read his name. Instead, he sees Lily Potter, sees Albus Dumbledore, sees Muggles whose names he never knew. Apparently, it's an honor to be a traitor and a murderer these days, Severus thinks darkly.

"Professor, I—"

Harry's about to say something maudlin, something profound, something that will feebly attempt to make everything right again—Severus can sense it, and he can't bear the humiliation of being exposed to it. Before the young man can continue, Severus snaps his hand hurriedly closed over the medal in his palm, like a door slamming or a clam in its shell.

"I'm _not_ your professor anymore, Potter," he interjects brusquely in attempt to avoid a scene. "In case you've forgotten, I abandoned my post."

"You had no choice but to abandon your post—you would've been killed if you'd stayed," Harry reminds him emphatically. "In fact, Professor McGonagall and I have already asked the Board of Governors to override the enchantments at Hogwarts. You'll have a portrait in the headmaster's office when the time comes. Beside Dumbledore's."

The hook-nosed wizard smirks. "And I suppose I'll be fortunate enough to have my face on a Chocolate Frog card as well?" he adds sardonically. "Surely there is no higher honor than that."

Harry sighs. He swallows hard, then makes a final attempt at peace. "Look, I can't undo the past. I can't make it so my dad never married my mum. And I can't take back all the times I didn't trust you," he tells him strongly, in a mixture of pleading and frustration. "But I've done what I can to try to make it up to you—to thank you—and to apologize."

There is nothing but silence from the Potions Master—the slow, dull, heavy kind; it moves through the room like a glacier, like a lead anchor to the bottom of the sea. Seeing the futility of his efforts, Harry turns to go.

"You're not a coward," he says suddenly, quietly. He stands, one foot on the threshold, the other on the stony walkway, and the memory of the last, horrible, accusatory words he had spoken to Severus Snape before today—while racing across the Hogwarts grounds shortly after Dumbledore's death nearly two years ago—replaying in his mind. "Far from it. You're the bravest man I've ever met. And my mum… she would've been so proud of you."

But the clumsy quiet only persists despite Harry's words, that mixture of simultaneous forgiveness and apology that had cost him so much pride to admit. It's all Harry can do to restrain himself from slamming the door as he turns from it and closes it behind him.

What Harry doesn't know is that, as he turns to head down the narrow walkway toward the street—toward Hogsmeade, toward anywhere but his former loathsome professor's melancholic cottage—the man he's left behind is still sitting, silent, in his chair by the fire. There are tears in Severus Snape's eyes; they well so high against his dark, dark pupils that he dares not move or speak or do more than barely breathe for fear of spilling them.

* * *

_A/N: I gratefully acknowledge that this story is loosely based on George Eliot's _Silas Marner_. To be continued… _


	3. Chapter 3: An Intruder

**The Mourner**

By Daphne Dunham

_A child, more than all other gifts  
That earth can offer to declining man,  
Brings hope with it, and forward-looking thoughts.  
_-Wordsworth

* * *

_**Chapter 3: An Intruder**_

* * *

The snow has fallen heavy this year. It clings to the cobblestone streets in drifts as tall as the hedges and drips from the roofs of the village in pillars of ice. Tonight is no different: Fat flakes fall furiously, forming an intricate lattice on the windowsills, on the silent sidewalks, on the red cars of the parked trains at Hogsmeade Station. In the quietness of the night, the snow is almost audible—like crisp sheets drying on a clothesline in the breeze. And as the blonde man paces, back and forth and back again, on the outskirts of the Forrest, the flakes are quick to blanket his steps. He sighs irritably and reaches into the folds of his traveling cloak; the arms on his handsome, platinum pocket watch confirm his suspicions of the hour: 12:07 a.m. 

"He should have been here by now," the man announces into the night air; his pale, pointed face is puckered in annoyance.

"You don't suppose he was caught, do you?" asks a cold, clear feminine voice nearby.

The man turns to look at the woman behind him. His wife, he thinks, is as beautiful as she is impatient: Wrapped in dark, decadent furs, Demetria Malfoy is leaning out the open door of the self-drawn carriage, an elegant relic of a French Muggle monarch long since guillotined. Her wavy, chestnut hair seems to float on the wind, quickly becoming veiled in the falling snow. Her eyes are a deep emerald, simultaneously piercing and hypnotic, and her cheeks—divided by a slender, regal nose—are like ripe peaches: smooth, soft, and flushed high with color; it's the result of chilliness, adrenaline, and loveliness.

"If he doesn't show up within the next three minutes, he'll wish he _had_ been caught, dearest," Draco replies.

Demetria's lips curl into a grim but satisfied smile. "Of that I have no doubt, my love," she assures him before she turns her attention back to the child in her arms.

The baby is babbling incoherent sentences, amusing herself by playing with the snow falling on her mittens, on her coat. She reaches out into the night, chasing the flakes, and giggles, oblivious to the strain in her parents' faces and voices. Demetria brushes her lips, albeit somewhat distractedly, against her little girl's auburn curls and resumes stroking the tiny, heart-shaped face. Then she glances over her shoulder, back into the carriage, toward her other child, the fair-haired toddler sleeping on the bench opposite her, his head propped awkwardly against the opposite door. At the sight of her son, Demetria feels slightly guilty: Bringing the twins here was unnecessary, she sees this now; they could have left the children back home—in their townhouse by the Seine with the au pair, where they'd be more comfortable, more safe. Draco had wanted to. But she'd protested: It was too difficult for her, too painful to imagine separating their family tonight—when they might confirm their fears.

"You don't _really_ think it's possible, do you, Draco?" Demetria whispers at the thought of it, tearing her eyes from her son in order to look at her husband. There is an unusual undercurrent of fear in her tone.

Draco's irritation melts momentarily, and he gazes at his small daughter with worry, concern. "I don't like the idea of it any more than you do," he tells his wife painfully, "but twins should be similar. Scorpius has already shown clear signs of magic, and there seems to be no other explanation why Perdita would not have yet also. When _he _finally gets here, we'll know for sure if she's a Squi—"

"Don't say it!" Demetria hisses, panicking, unable to hear the horrible possibility uttered. "Not yet—not until we know for sure."

It's then that they spot him: Scurrying along the edge of the Forrest toward them is a short, shabby figure. The lantern he's carrying illuminates his scruffy, dirty face—the scarred eye and dual rows of discolored, half-missing teeth. The disheveled man huffs as he makes his way toward them, glancing over his shoulder nervously and stumbling through the snow, half-tripping with each step. Demetria gasps when she sees him, and she leaps anxiously from the carriage to stand by her husband's side, still carrying her daughter in her arms.

"You're late, you vile cad!" she barks at him from over the top of Perdita's ginger head. "You should know better than to tangle with a Malfoy!"

For a moment, it seems as though she may withdraw her wand to hex him, but Draco has already raised his hand to silence her. He steps forward hurriedly, clutching at the man's robes so urgently that the scoundrel snaps backward and forward in a violent, jerking fashion. "Well?! Did you get in?" he demands.

Between gasps for air, the scruffy man bobs his balding head in affirmation. "Aye," he pants. "By the skin o' me teeth, but aye."

"And?" the golden-haired wizard probes, icy eyes bulging and teeth clenched with agitation.

"And wot? She's not on the list," the scoundrel replies, nodding toward the toddler in Demetria's arms. "Just as ye thought. Scorpius Malfoy's there a'right, but not 'er—no Perdita Malfoy."

Demetria struggles to suppress a sob at the news, and Draco looks suddenly dazed. He drops the scoundrel's robes in his disillusionment; it seems as though the world is spinning. Their worst fears have been confirmed: His daughter is not on the Hogwarts registry; she lacks magical powers. A Malfoy has sired a Squib.

"You lie!" Demetria's seething. But even as she speaks the words, she knows she's only deceiving herself. The little girl in her arms is useless, an embarrassment and a stain on their family name—Demetria knows is; she's known it for some time, for over a year, when the girl's twin brother started changing the colors of the mobile dangling over their crib, while she just lie there, giggling like the little fool she is.

The scoundrel cackles cruelly at the Malfoys' heartache. "Ye can call me whatever ye like, marm," he laughs. "But t'ain't goin' ta change the truth—she's a Squib, she is."

"You filthy—you foul—!"

A murderous glare coats Demetria's face, and Draco steps protectively between his wife and daughter and the imp antagonizing them. "_That_ is quite enough," he says coolly to the unsavory man. Then, looking back at Demetria, he adds more kindly, "I think we're quite through here, don't you, dearest?"

Demetria nods vigorously in agreement, her green eyes still flashing in fury, and together, they turn to leave. They've barely taken one step back toward the carriage carrying the sleeping Scorpius, though, when they are abruptly interrupted.

"Not so fast," the scoundrel hisses, pressing the tip of the knife against the back of the blonde aristocrat's traveling cloak. The sharp point cuts a small hole in through the fabric, through the wizard's robes, so that the icy tip presses against the latter's back. Draco halts mid-step, arms raised as though in instant surrender.

"Breakin' inta 'ogwarts 'as its price," the scoundrel continues. "Not an easy task, as ye know, so I'll be takin' me reward now, guv'na—the second half ye agreed to pay me."

Arms still raised, the blonde wizard turns on his heel swiftly, back to face the filthy figure before him. "Of course, how careless of me to forget," he says with mock sympathy. "A well-earned reward, indeed. If you'll lower your dagger, I'll reach into my robes and get it for you."

The disheveled man licks his lips and claps his hands together excitedly, in anticipation of the second satchel of Galleons agreed upon in the course of their bargaining. He's already envisioning what the money will afford him—can already taste the bottles of firewhisky and practically feel the skin of Knockturn Alley wenches against his. And indeed, Draco, as promised, reaches into his robes. Rather than withdraw the velvet coin purse in his pocket, though, he promptly pulls out his wand.

"_Obliviate!_"

But the scoundrel—despite his girth and the shadows surrounding them—is too quick. He narrowly dodges the spell hurtling through the dark, blustering night toward him and returns the favor. In moments, swears and hexes are flying back and forth between the two parties, a blur of obscenities and bursting red and orange light illuminating the falling snow.

"The carriage! Get back to the carriage!" Draco urges Demetria as they hurry the few short feet through the drifts.

Demetria trips as she reaches for the ornate, gold handle of the carriage door. "Perdita!" she shrieks as the child, sobbing in fear and pain, is torn from her arms in the fall. She lunges for the little, mittened hand but is too late: The scoundrel is at her heels; he scoops the baby up, leaving Demetria to stumble, just out of reach, back down into the snow. "My daughter!"

Instantly, Draco dives after them all as they struggle, wand extended and furious. "Leave the baby—I'm warning you!" he bellows at the foul man.

The scoundrel cackles wildly, though, putting more distance between himself and the stumbling aristocrats. "Ye'll be hearin' from me, guv'na—when I get me money, ye'll get yer Squib back!" he shouts over his shoulder.

A sharp crackle pierces the air then, and the scoundrel, still toting the screaming, chestnut-haired toddler, disappears in a flash of light.

"_Sectumsempra!"_ Draco calls, his curse aimed squarely at the spot where the foul abductor had stood mere moments before. He's split seconds too late.

- - -

"Feck!"

He's not sure if he's Splinched himself—or if that desperate Sectumsempra he heard uttered as he Disapparated actually did reach him after all. Either way, though, he's bleeding. Profusely.

The scoundrel staggers. He hasn't Apparated far: a little closer to the village, just far enough to escape the Malfoys and have a chance at hiding, at holding their daughter—Squib though she is—at ransom. He needs medical attention, though—and quickly. The pain in his side is blinding him, and unable to walk further, he sags to his knees.

"Shut yer gob, ye little brat!" he hisses at the baby hollering in his arms. The little girl only cries harder and struggles against him, thrashing wildly, her tiny feet kicking his thighs. "Fine! Ye want to get free, then off wi' ye! Die, freeze, see if I care!" He pushes the toddler away from him, into a snowdrift. She sits, stunned into silence by the abruptness of his movements, and watches as he drags himself to lean against a nearby tree.

"Bloody Merlin's—" he's seething, teeth clenched as if trying to dam up the pain plaguing his body. He looks down at his abdomen, sees the thick, red fluid saturating his cloak. His eyes seem dark, cloudy, fading in and out of focus. He's so cold; he shivers. And the child is screaming again. "Shut it!" he barks at her.

His head bobs; it feels heavy, and he can barely lift it up again. He squints. In the distance, he sees a light—not the heavenly kind; he knows he doesn't deserve that, especially after kidnapping a little girl—and not the hellish kind; he's too cold to be in the company of the Devil. No, it's a house—a cottage, high on the hill, a strange roofline and Tudor timbers atop a narrow, precarious walkway. There's a candle inside—someone is awake within. Fresh hope beats warmly through his veins, and the scoundrel struggles to pull himself to his feet. If he can just make it up the walkway, up to the house—if he can pawn the little girl off as his own daughter, he might stand a chance….

"Come on, you," he growls at the baby. He reaches toward her, to take her with him. Alarm crinkles the child's small, pointed face, and she scrambles to her feet at once with a wail, half-crawling, half-walking through the snow drifts, desperate to flee her cruel abductor.

"Git back 'ere, ye worthless—" The scoundrel staggers forward in pursuit of the little girl, but he only falls, face-down in the blood-tainted snow, silent and still, never to move again.

And overhead, hovering along the horizon en route back to Paris, the Malfoys' carriage soars, the travelers within oblivious to the fact that their daughter is so close.

"He knows where to find us, dearest," Draco reassures his wailing wife. "He'll be in touch soon enough—he'll want his money."

"And if he isn't?!" Demetria challenges, near hysterics. She's rocking Scorpius protectively in her lap: She's lost one child tonight; she can't bear to lose another.

"He _will_ be," Draco repeats with a confidence he doesn't necessarily feel. He turns to look out the carriage window, at the snow falling around them, and dares to think what he won't yet admit to his wife: Even if the scoundrel doesn't contact them—even if that loathsome scoundrel doesn't try to seek ransom for Perdita, he must take the truth into account when weighing their options: His daughter _is _only a Squib, after all.

- - -

Severus Snape runs a hand over his scalp; his lank hair hangs to his shoulders in greasy strands, dark black with occasional threads of pure white emerging from his temples. He glances up at the clock overhead with bleary eyes. He's been working for hours without being completely cognizant of the time that has passed, and he blinks, startled to discover that it's nearly 12:30 in the morning. With a sigh, Severus waves his wand over his cauldron, extinguishing the flame bouncing beneath it. One more task—gathering the gingerroot from the hothouse—and he'll call it a night, he supposes. After all, the stock of Wit-Sharpening potion he's promised Master Applewither is best left until morning, when he's well rested.

Pulling his cloak over his shoulders, Severus glances out the window. The snow shows no signs of tapering off any time soon, and while trekking around the lawn to the hothouse in it is not ideal, it would be worse to wait until morning, when he'll be forced to wade through even more of the cold stuff. He steps out into the dark, leaving the door unlatched behind him; he'll be glad for the ease of entry when he returns, pockets full and hands freezing, anxious for the warmth of the fire and his quilted bed upstairs.

The hothouse is crowded, a tangled room of leaves and roots and blooms. Severus treads carefully through it, anxious to avoid tripping over Devil's Snare—or knocking a potted Mandrake off its shelf. The ginger is easy enough to locate; he trims some roots from its base and tucks them into his pocket speedily before latching the glass door behind him and venturing back into the snow, steps heavy and shoulder high, shielding himself from the cold gusts whipping at his cloak and hair and cheeks.

It's an uneventful excursion, to say the least—until Severus reaches the threshold of the cottage. He stands, half inside and half out, in a sudden panic: Through his sleep-seared eyes he sees a reddish tint on the floor—there, by the hearth—flames. Like blazing fingers, they reach from the fireplace, grasping at his floor menacingly, threatening to destroy his home, his work—all he has left. Heart racing, Severus rushes inside with a start, but after only a single step forward, he halts abruptly, now in full view of the fireplace. He pauses, hesitates, his breath catching in his throat with a startled, suppressed gasp. His dark, tired eyes have deceived him: It's not the flames of his fire spreading from his hearth; it's a baby, a child. A little girl.

Her hair is a playful mess of loose curls; they're the color of amber or the golden-red light that flickers atop the candles at his bedside. Her tiny eyes are framed with long lashes and closed with sleep; her little body, stretched out on the rug by the fire, moves slowly, rhythmically as she breathes. Severus steps slowly forward, leaning closer to the child. Her skin is the color of fresh milk, and she can't be much older than three years. She kicks out suddenly as she dozes, a muddy, miniature, booted foot trying to walk or keep monsters at bay. With a pang of unease, Severus wonders what she's dreaming about, if she's frightened. He reaches out to her, and his heart beats even faster as he scoops her into his arms. The baby's head nestles into the comfortable corner formed between the crook of his arm and his chest. He brushes a bit of ash from her cheek as gently as he can, and she stirs, her lashes fluttering like birds' wings. When she looks up at him, he sees her eyes: green, soft like jade.

And Severus just can't help himself: He cannot help but think of Lily Potter.

* * *

_A/N: I gratefully acknowledge that this story is loosely based on George Eliot's _Silas Marner_. To be continued… _


	4. Chapter 4: The Parcel

**The Mourner  
**By Daphne Dunham

_A child, more than all other gifts  
__That earth can offer to declining man,  
__Brings hope with it, and forward-looking thoughts.  
_- Wordsworth

* * *

_**Chapter 4: The Parcel**_

* * *

For a moment, it seems as though the little girl might cry; her bottom lip quivers and her eyes grow wide. It's only when she doesn't that Severus realizes that she is, in fact, shivering. Indeed, she must be cold: Her coat and mittens are lightweight—more fashionable than practical—and they're soaked through with snow; worse, the soles of her boots are still slick with ice. She's not dressed properly for this weather, not to mention to be alone—abandoned. In moments, Severus has her wrapped in a spare quilt and sitting on the edge of his worktable. He leans over her, struggling to untie the damp, dirty knots fastening her boots to her feet. 

"I don't suppose you can speak yet?" he asks her with an air of formality completely unsuitable for a toddler while he works.

But she's too busy looking around the cottage to pay him attention, her eyes wandering wildly over her surroundings: the flames dancing at the hearth; the shelves lined with vials of multi-colored liquids and jars of amorphous, fleshy objects; the small kitchenette in the corner; and the tiny living space, cramped with a sofa and walls lined with overflowing bookshelves. The baby points and babbles incoherently as she admires the variety before her. Severus is still arguing with her shoelaces—and muttering frustrations under his breath—when she realizes that several of these wonders are within her reach: She flips through some pages of the book that sits beside her on the worktable, then finding it rather dull, grabs at a nearby beaker instead.

"Uh-oh!" she says as she watches it fall to the floor. The jar smashes instantaneously, narrowly missing a landing on Severus' foot; a green gelatinous substance in a speckled liquid oozes into the cracks in the floorboards.

At once, Severus abandons the boots; his face contorts into a scowl, and he's hissing angrily as he reaches into his robes and withdraws his wand. "_Reparo!_"

The little girl squeals with delight as she watches the glass shards knit themselves back together before her eyes. Her small hands clap as with another flick of the wand, the mess is removed and the beaker is back beside her on the worktable. In awe, she reaches for it once more, as if to examine it and make sure she can believe what her eyes have seen. Severus, though, intercepts her outstretched fingers before they have time to curl around the glass lip.

"No you don't," he tells her, holding her hand back and pushing the once-broken beaker just out of reach. "You've already done quite enough damage for one night."

Regardless of the scolding, though, the girl only giggles, amused by his scowl.

"You think it's funny, do you?" Severus asks her, eyebrow raised. Her smile doesn't fade though, despite the severity of his tone. Instead, she reaches out to him, places her hand gently on his cheek, patting him affectionately. Despite himself, Severus can't help but soften. "A more important question, I suppose, is who are you? And how did you get here?" he murmurs as he looks into her too-trusting face.

Although his questions have been spoken more rhetorically than in earnest expectation of an answer, the little girl turns to look over her shoulder. She extends a tiny index finger and points in the direction of the front door. "Outside with bad man," she says vaguely, in semi-articulate baby-speak.

Severus looks toward the door; when he had left it ajar to go to the hothouse, he had been expecting to ease his reentry into the cottage, not open an invitation for a mysterious toddler to wander in and turn up at his hearth. Yet his curiosity mounts as he gazes toward the entryway, where the baby seems to have come from. He lifts her in his arms and walks across the room cautiously, unsure what to expect beyond the plank separating them from the snowy outdoors.

Just as the little girl indicated, he sees them now: the tiny indentations—footsteps, slightly blurred by the freshly falling snow—crossing over his from his excursion to the hothouse, leading up the walkway from the roadside. Severus squints through the shadows, stunned that the toddler could have made her way up the hill to the cottage, and still holding her, he steps further outdoors, following her trail.

He sees the body at the bottom of the hill by the roadside; he's a round, middle-aged man, shabbily dressed and lying in mound of red-tinted snow.

"Bad man!" the child shrieks when she too spots the scoundrel's corpse. She burrows further into the safety of Severus' arms, and he feels the warm wetness of her tears against the exposed skin of his neck. He holds her tightly, in a reassuring embrace. He can only guess at how she arrived here with this man—or what he may have done to her—but he knows by her reaction that there was nothing good that transpired here. A cold fire burns in Severus' blood at the thought of the possibilities, at the sight of the dead scoundrel at the edge of his property, at the memory of the neglect and abuse of his own childhood and the idea of similar horrors transpiring in the life of an innocent little girl. Disgusted, Severus turns away from the body.

"Shhhh," he soothes, running a hand along the baby's head, her hair.

- - -

A sudden hush falls across the pub: The piper in the corner lets out a final, fading note; the laughter from the rowdy group at the bar stops short; and even Madam Rosmerta—still coquettishly dispensing mead after all these years—pauses with a bottle raised in mid-pour. It's clear that the sight of Severus Snape in the pub is nothing short of a novelty—let alone at this hour—and with a child in tow, too. And all are curious by the unexpected appearance of the recluse, standing in the shadows of the doorway, his dark robes billowing in the breeze, like a strange apparition.

In truth, it's just as much a shock to Severus to find himself here as well. For so long, he's eschewed contact with the world outside Raveloe Cottage. However, at this hour and under these circumstances, he could see no alternative than to Apparate into the village for help, for advice, for assistance. He shifts uncomfortably at the realization of the effect his appearance is having on the pub, but it can't be avoided: In the darkened Hogsmeade streets, the Three Broomsticks is his only hope for immediate attention.

"Master Snape, what a surprise it is to see you," Rosmerta says at last, emerging from the crowd and breaking the silence as she beckons him in. Her greeting is warm, though her astonishment is still evident. There is a rosy hue high in her cheeks, and her smile is kind; although white hair has begun to creep in at her temples, she's still just as lovely as she was when she first came to Hogsmeade as a young woman.

"I see you have a little parcel with you, too," Rosmerta continues. Her grin widens as her eyes, twinkling, rest on the amber-haired child swaddled in a quilt Severus' arms. She peers into the tiny face with a maternal regard, admiring those wide, green eyes and that sweet, pink complexion. "And a pretty little one at that," she coos.

Rosmerta sets aside the mead in favor of reaching out to brush the little girl's cheek affectionately. The baby withdraws shyly at her touch, burying her head against Severus' shoulder; once again, he can't help but feel his grasp around her little body tighten protectively. "Oh, there, there, someone's feeling quite bashful," Rosmerta chuckles.

For a moment, Severus isn't quite sure if she means him or the girl, then, remembering himself, he speaks. The silence hovers over the pub like a cold mist, like time suspended as he talks. All eyes on him, Severus tells them of the corpse lying at the edge of his property by the road, of the tiny footsteps up the hill to his house, and of how he found her—the little girl like fire and gemstone—at his hearth. It takes a moment for the dreadfulness of the events of Severus Snape's evening to creep through the crevices of the room; not since the Battle of Hogwarts have such peculiar and Dark things transpired in Hogsmeade, after all. Only after he's done with the tale does anyone dare to breathe, it seems.

It's Rosmerta who, once again, breaks the solemn, stunned silence of the pub. She reels around in panic. "Why, we've got to _do_ something!" she urges boldly. "We've got a dead body—a man may have been murdered, and this little girl's got no family!"

At her vocalization, the pub is in a sudden stir, alive with alarm. There are barks of panic, of suggestion, of speculation. Chairs scrape against the wooden floor as troops of men abandon their firewhisky. Some move eagerly in packs, up to Raveloe Cottage, intent on seeing the corpse, on minding the corpse—removing it from the grounds and bringing it to the Ministry for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement to tend to. Others, concerned about the grave events, rush home to their families, to make sure they are safe.

"Go on back up home, Master Snape—there's little more we can do until morning, and you must be exhausted. I'll keep an eye on this wee one tonight," Rosmerta volunteers, reaching out to take the baby from him, as the pub empties and falls into quiet. "And tomorrow we'll notify the Ministry and sort this out—find her parents or at least a suitable foster home."

For the briefest of instants, Severus hesitates before handing the child over. Of course Madam Rosmerta should take her: He knows nothing about babies, let alone little _girls_—and this one in particular has caused him nothing but trouble from the instant he spotted her at the hearth of his cottage. Reason overcomes his reluctance, and he passes the baby to Rosmerta with a nod. "You're sure it's no trouble?" he says.

"Oh, none at all!" Rosmerta insists warmly, accepting the bundle with a broad grin. "She'll be a delight."

Severus watches for a moment as she fusses over the toddler, readjusting the quilt around her to keep her warm and patting her tiny back as she holds her close. Rosmerta speaks to the girl all the while. Severus has always found it a bit humiliating the way women revert to incoherent, high-pitched baby speak when addressing such small children; suddenly everything becomes "teensy-weensy," and nonsense phrases like "woo-woo" are appended to otherwise usual words. However, watching Rosmerta with the child, Severus feels confident in her ability to take good care of her—and the girl seems content enough in the witch's arms. Feeling suddenly obsolete, unnecessary, he turns to leave.

It isn't until he's at the door that he hears it: The whimpering rising above Rosmerta's high-pitched, hushed maternal tones. Severus' hand stills on the doorknob, and he pauses mid-step over the threshold; he turns to look back. The baby is crying. Rosmerta's doing her best to calm her, but there's no consolation. Instead, she's struggling to reach out to Severus, her hands extended longingly, as if to pull him back to her. And her eyes, glassy with tears, are staring after him, pleading with him. Green eyes, like sea glass, like Lily's eyes. Severus hesitates at the sight of those eyes; he'd disappointed Lily before and has lived with regret ever since; he can't bear to see disappointment in such similar eyes again.

With a sigh, Severus steps back inside, closing the door again. He walks toward where Madam Rosmerta and the baby stand, and he reaches out his arms.

- - -

"The Ministry sent you, didn't they?" he asks Hermione Granger-Weasley crossly as he watches her move about the tiny kitchen.

Hermione declines to provide an answer and pretends she doesn't hear him as she busies herself with the tea things. Her suspicious silence, however, makes the truth quite plain to Severus, and he lets out a long, loud hiss of disapproval.

"All the Ministry wants, professor, is to make sure that the girl's best interests are being looked after," she explains calmly at this. "The latest report this morning was that the man you found her with was most definitely not her father; he was a petty thief named Fagan—always in and out of trouble with the law, though nothing as severe as kidnapping before. We still don't know who her parents are; no one's reported a missing child. And I'm here because the Wizengamot is anxious to rule on the matter of the girl's custody until the case is solved."

"They think I can't manage a child, is that it?" Severus seethes. "I've handled hundreds of children—thousands. I was a professor, for Merlin's sake."

Hermione pauses awkwardly, nearly dropping the tea tray in her hands. "Yes, but you were always a rather cruel teacher, you know," she blurts, the comment slipping from her lips before she has the foresight to stop it. Hesitantly, she raises her eyes to meet Severus', to see his reaction, that familiar fury simmering just below the surface of his skin.

"I don't recall having asked you for your critique of my teaching methods, Ms. Granger-Weasley," he says coolly. "And _cruel_ or not as said methods may have been, they were nonetheless effective: My students always fared well on their Ministry-administered tests. Even Neville Longbottom managed to pass his O.W.L.s, if memory serves me."

With a sigh, Hermione resumes pouring out the tea. Experience has dictated to her that Severus would rebuff any advice or assistance, and so she is neither surprised nor dismayed by his caustic phrases. Instead, she can only shake her head and suppress an amused grin. "A baby is quite different, professor," she replies as her eyes rest on the little girl sitting on his lap. There's something cherubic about the child—her round, pretty face and bright eyes, her auburn curls, and the way she giggles blithely as she plays with the doll she's holding. "She'll need love and tenderness," Hermione says warmly as she watches her. Then, she looks up sharply at Severus as she hands him his tea cup. "You won't be able to call her a dunderhead when she makes a mistake, you know, or deduct House points when she needs to be punished."

At such criticism, Severus' eyes flicker dangerously and his brows move to form a deep, displeased ravine down the center of his forehead. Then, grudgingly, he accepts the proffered cup. "Thank you for stating the obvious," he scoffs; his hold on the baby becomes increasingly protective. "However, I'll have you know that, contrary to popular belief, I am not altogether unfamiliar with… _tenderness_, as you call it. I had a mother, you know."

"Did you?" As she takes a seat at the table opposite him and the curly-haired toddler, Hermione cannot help but be shocked by the thought of Severus Snape having a doting mother. From the little she'd gathered of Eileen Prince from the newspapers she'd unearthed all those years ago as a student at Hogwarts, she'd envisioned Severus' mother as the cold sort or the absent sort—the sort incapable of showing affection to a small boy, of combing his hair or taking him to get his first wand. The idea that he should have been raised any differently causes her to choke on her tea a moment.

Severus glares. "My mother cared well enough," he snaps indignantly. "She _sacrificed _for me—she worked common Muggle jobs to send me to school—and she tried to protect me from my worthless drunk of a father. Furthermore, as you have—no doubt—been made aware, there was someone dear to me…." His voice trails off uncomfortably at the allusion to Lily Evans Potter, and he hurriedly clears his throat before Hermione can either confirm or question him further on the nature of his relationship with her—or, worse, interject unbearable words of sympathy for his loss. "The point is, Ms. Granger-Weasley, I am not wholly unversed in how to be affectionate," he adds tersely.

Accepting the cue not to dwell on the matter of whether or not Severus Snape has loved and been loved, Hermione draws them back to the matter at hand. She peers more carefully around the cottage; it is tidy enough, secure enough, comfortable enough—though small. And she looks at the little girl, obviously freshly bathed and dressed in green to match her eyes, nourished and safe—and, most importantly, visibly happy. And she watches the way the sallow-skinned wizard holds the baby and how his hard eyes soften when he glances down at her; there is a gentle manner about him, a kindness she'd never seen in him at school when she was his student. Hermione nods in approval of it all—from the home to the care to the caretaker.

"I see you've done some shopping for her," she remarks kindly, indicating the new clothes and doll. Out of the corner of her eye, she can't help but notice a few other very un-middle-aged-bachelor-type items in the sitting area, on the sofa, on an end table: some brightly-colored children's books and stuffed animals, as well as some freshly laundered clothes—tiny dresses in telling shades of pastel pink and purple.

"Rosmerta helped," Severus replies quietly. "And the girl chose the doll."

Hermione chuckles good-naturedly. "I think it's time we stop calling her 'the girl', professor," she tells him. "If you're to be her foster father, perhaps you best think of a proper name for her. Have you any ideas?"

For a moment Severus is quiet. Hermione watches him think, watches him watch the baby balanced on his knees; there is a sadness about him as he ponders an answer to her question, and even as he opens his mouth to reply, Hermione suspects she has an inkling of where his thoughts are roaming, of the type of name he'll select for the green-eyed, auburn-haired toddler smiling up at him.

"I will call her Proserpina," Severus says softly at last.

Ever the know-it-all, Hermione's been right in her assumption, of course. Although Severus declines to elaborate on his reasons, she knows the truth behind his choice: This little girl is vaguely similar in looks and demeanor to Lily Evans, is like Lily reborn to him in the form of a daughter, brought back to him from the dead.

"That's beautiful, professor," Hermione tells him with such gentleness that it causes a not-so-subtle shade of scarlet to rise in the cheeks of the otherwise sallow-skinned wizard. She smiles at this, half touched, half amused to see his discomfort. "Proserpina looks quite nearly the same size and age of my little Rose, you know," she tells him cheerfully. "Harry has a son around the same age al—"

At the mention of Harry Potter, Severus looks up sharply. "Yes, I've been made aware of Potter's son, Ms. Granger-Weasley."

His voice is cold, as if to freeze the topic of the Potters in mid-mention, like breath on a winter's morning. And his already-black eyes darken further; they drift up to the mantle over the fireplace. For a moment, they linger there, on the intricately carved wood box he still keeps. Indeed, he does know about young Albus Severus Potter: Harry keeps writing to him—once around Christmastime, once mid-year. Every year. Since the Battle. Severus has continued to keep the letters, some opened, others not, in this box—just as he admitted to Harry the last time he saw him, the day the young man brought him his Order of Merlin. And Severus has continued not to reply to the letters: Even after all this time, Harry is nothing more to him than a bitter reminder of how he has loved—continues to love—Lily without return, that Lily betrayed him as much as he betrayed her—choosing James, having his son. Even after all this time, Harry is nothing more to Severus than a reminder of his horrible mistakes, of his role in causing Lily's death, of the regret he's endured daily since.

"Harry means well, professor—you're the only link he has to his mother anymore, and he _does_ feel very sorry," Hermione lectures. "He's been trying for years. If you could just write to him—just once—"

Although she's attempting to be gentle, there's still something bossy, something reprimanding in Hermione's tone. It causes Severus to glower with resentment. "If I'm not mistaken, Ms. Granger-Weasley, we're meant to discuss Proserpina—not Potter," he hisses. "After all, I believe the Department of Magical Law Enforcement is paying you to investigate the safety and well-being of an abandoned child, not give me a sermon on the virtues of Harry Potter."

Hermione's face flushes; she closes her mouth abruptly and focuses her attention on her tea cup while she regains her composure. She takes a final sip, draining the last of the liquid, and clearing her throat, stands up from the table—a definitive indication that their interview is at an end. For a moment, Hermione ponders telling him that it's been pleasant seeing him again after all these years but thinks better of it; it's a lie that neither of them would believe. "Thank you for the tea, Professor Snape," is all she says instead.

Severus only nods vaguely, barely interested, as she prepares to leave: His attention is instead focused on Proserpina, watching her dutifully, adoringly, fascinated. She drops her doll, and he immediately sweeps his arm down to the ground to retrieve it for her. She giggles and claps her hands in appreciation as she accepts the toy once more. Then, hugging the doll close, she leans back against Severus' chest, completely comfortable, completely dependent on him. There is the faint hint of a smile tugging at the corners of Severus' mouth as he cradles the child in his arms—Hermione notices it as she pulls her traveling cloak over her shoulders; she's never seen the semblance of a smile on Severus Snape's face before and can't help but half-smile herself.

"Well, Ms. Granger-Weasley? What, may I ask, do you have to report to the Ministry about your visit?"

Severus' question is sudden, unexpected, and his tone is urgent. It catches Hermione off guard. She hesitates a moment, pausing mid-step by the doorway. When she turns to look at him one last time, she sees that his ghost of a smile has faded to make way for soberness—worry, even.

"I'm sorry, professor, but we don't usually divulge—" Hermione begins to explain, but when she sees the fleeting flicker of disappointment dash across Severus' face, she hesitates. Her eyes rest on the little girl sitting on her former professor's lap, gurgling happily as she plays. Watching them together, two discarded, forgotten souls quite content in one another's company, she can't bear to cause them stress. Hermione reminds herself that she has been known to break the rules on occasion before—and that she certainly could stand to do so now as well.

"I'll tell them," she says with a broad, genuine grin, "that Proserpina is very well adjusted and perfectly well cared for—that she couldn't have a guardian more devoted to her…. And I'll tell them that I highly recommend that she stay where she is, here with you."

* * *

_A/N: I gratefully acknowledge that this story is loosely based on George Eliot's _Silas Marner_. To be continued… _


	5. Chapter 5: The Recluse's Daughter

**The Mourner  
**By Daphne Dunham

_A child, more than all other gifts  
__That earth can offer to declining man,  
__Brings hope with it, and forward-looking thoughts.  
_- Wordsworth

* * *

_**Chapter 5: The Recluse's Daughter**_

* * *

He wouldn't quite call her spoiled: He's far from a pauper, but potion-making doesn't quite afford him the ability to incessantly shower her with fine things, after all—even though he'd like to. And it's not as though she asks him for anything unreasonable to begin with—just the occasional toffee from Honeydukes or, at Madam Rosmerta's suggestion, some ribbons for her hair. However, he can't say he's particularly stringent with her either: The mischief she manages to get herself into is, after all, trivial compared to some of the things he saw from students over the years at Hogwarts—not to mention some of the things he himself did at her age. 

"Proserpina, you haven't finished your maths," he calls one evening from the kitchen table, where he has had her sit to study while he bottled Calming Draught for his next delivery to the Apothecary. Severus stands over the abandoned parchment on which he'd written a few dozen simple addition and subtraction problems for her to work on; only half have been attempted.

Within moments, the curly, reddish head appears around the corner of the staircase. When she steps forward, she's wearing a sheepish look and is protectively clutching a small, leather-bound book to her chest. "Sorry, Papa," she says, her tiny six-year-old voice wavering.

"What have you been doing all this time if not your work?" Severus asks her rather sternly, a finger pointing down at her incomplete assignment staring up at him on the table.

Proserpina looks guiltily down at the book in her arms. Enough of the gold lettering on the spine is visible to gather that she's carrying around a care-worn copy of _The Tales of Beedle the Bard_. "Reading," she replies meekly.

Severus sighs and takes the book away until the math is finished. He knows Proserpina should be punished; the last time she did this, he'd tried to discipline her: He'd made her sit in the corner of the room by herself, staring at the walls, at the cobwebs in the crevices. She'd sobbed so hard that he'd given up on the punishment after three minutes—partly for fear that she'd make herself ill from the purging, and partly because he couldn't bear to see the tears in her eyes. Madam Rosmerta had advised him to give Proserpina a spanking next time around instead, but Severus has never been able to bring himself to do it. In fact, any time he thinks to deny her or scold her, to restrict her or discipline her, he remembers his own cheerless childhood and quickly changes his mind.

It helps that Proserpina's so naturally affable, too. She's quick to grin, to giggle; she's eager to help, to learn; she complies and usually behaves—and, especially with him, she's patient, loving. She'd be, he's often thought, in Hufflepuff if she attended Hogwarts. Severus doesn't spend too much time dwelling on this, though; it is, after all, a moot point: Proserpina has never exhibited magical abilities—and given the fact that she was found so deep in wizarding territory, he can only deduce that she is a Squib, not a Muggle.

Severus can't say he's particularly disappointed either. It would have been nice to have a young witch to raise, to teach and explore magic with, to nurture as a protégé. But Proserpina is skilled enough in other subjects as it is; she proves most impressive in Latin and literature—and she really is quite useful as an assistant in potion-making, mashing roots for him or counting out dried Billywig stings. Watching Proserpina grow, Severus feels confident in her abilities to live in the wizarding world without magic; watching her grow, Severus feels proud of her, pleased with her progress in ways he wouldn't if she were a witch—if magical life came easy to her.

- - -

"Awww, look at her—so happy," Madam Rosmerta comments with a warm smile. Her eyes are fixed on Proserpina sitting on the floor by the fireplace, playing with the kitten Severus has given her for her Christmas. She dangles yarn in front of it, lifts it up and giggles as the cat bats at it, trying to trap it in its paws. She'd seen the kitten last week in the window of the Magical Menagerie on a routine trip to Gringotts and had instantly been infatuated with the fluffy, butterscotch-colored fur and probing eyes. Watching Proserpina glance over her shoulder longingly as they walked away from the shop window, Severus had known at once the gift he'd get her. And indeed, all day long today, he's been rewarded for his thoughtfulness with her laughter, hugs, and smiles.

"You really did a good and noble thing when you took her in, Master Snape," Rosmerta continues.

It's not the first time Severus has heard this, of course, but he shifts uncomfortably nonetheless: In the seven years it's been since he's adopted Proserpina, he's noticed a distinct change in the way the Hogsmeade residents treat him. The women smile and nod and wish him well when they see him in the village with his little girl, running errands or making a delivery of potions to the Apothecary. The men offer to buy him a firewhisky at the Three Broomsticks, should he ever decide to join them there, and the schoolboys no longer toss rocks through his windows or play games to see who can get closest to his door without fleeing in fear. Rosmerta herself has been quite supportive, ever-present, dispensing more parenting advice than Severus can necessarily say he's wanted or needed, but he supposes she's been useful nonetheless.

"You've been most obliging yourself," Severus concedes with a stiff nod.

Madam Rosmerta's face brightens, seems to beam; appreciation from Severus Snape is a rare thing, and she cannot help but feel flattered. She wouldn't call him a _changed _man since Proserpina entered his life—he's still generally somber and reclusive, and he has been known to wield his tongue in a biting fashion from time to time. But there _is _something vaguely softer, gentler, more polite about him. "I daresay that little girl's done as much good for you as you have for her, Master Snape," Rosmerta tells him kindly, acknowledging this.

A rosy hue rises high in Severus' cheeks at her words, and he narrowly misses severing his index finger from his hand as he slices the fruitcake she has brought them as a token of goodwill for the holidays. He feels fortunate to be rescued from further humiliation by Proserpina, who appears suddenly at his side, kitten in tow.

"Papa, what do you think of calling him Beedle?" she asks him excitedly, lifting the kitten up in her hands for him to look at. The cat blinks at him blankly, unmoved by her proposal for its name and decidedly disinterested in him as well.

"A cat named Beetle… That may be a bit confusing for it, don't you think?" Severus says skeptically, raising an eyebrow.

Proserpina giggles, positive that he's only teasing her: She knows that a man as quick-witted as her father is very well aware what she means. "Not _Beetle_, Papa—like the bug," she explains in mock frustration. "_Beedle_—like the Bard. From my book."

"Of course, how foolish of me," Severus replies in a sarcastic monotone and with a knowing, crooked half-smile that only makes her giggle again. He places a hand on the top her head, affectionately smoothing back her auburn curls from her glowing, heart-shaped face. "Before we settle on a name, though, I think you'd best wish Madam Rosmerta a happy Christmas," he tells her; his tone is kind but expectant, clearly attempting to teach good manners.

Proserpina's eyes are vivid, like fresh leaves in springtime, as she cheerfully does as her father suggests. It _is _a happy Christmas, after all—a perfect one. And it remains that way until later that night, once Rosmerta has returned to the village, once Proserpina has curled up with the cat named Beedle and gone to sleep upstairs, and once Severus is blowing out the last of the candles and heading for the stairs himself.

The tapping on the window is very faint; for a moment, Severus thinks he may have misheard—that it was a creak in the floorboards or a branch falling in the wind. Turning, he sees it: the large tawny owl that has visited about twice a year every year for the past several years. It is with great annoyance and reluctance that Severus opens the window and accepts the envelope marked in the familiar handwriting.

"Shoo," he tells the bird coldly when it looks at him expectantly, as if to ask for a bit of bread or biscuit to sustain it on its journey back to Godric's Hollow. He slams the window shut again before the owl has a chance to nip or squawk in protest. The creature should know better by now.

He considers tossing the letter in the fireplace and watching it burn in the dying embers, reveling in the way the parchment curls and darkens as it meets this slow, deliberate death. He also considers tossing the envelope in the enchanted box sitting on the mantel where it can join its discarded older brothers. But instead, Severus pauses as he approaches the fireplace, and in that moment's hesitation he does something he hasn't done in three years: He opens Harry Potter's letter.

In the fading light of the fire and the tiny flame of his candle, Severus tears open the envelope. Slipping his fingers inside, he finds the parchment, across the top of which is written the usual salutation: _Dear Professor Snape, Hoping this letter finds you well_…. Severus' eyes narrow to slits; the irony of the fact that Harry insists on calling him "professor" now—when he's no longer his professor, when he so often refused this formality as a student—has never failed to simultaneously insult and amuse him. Annoyed by Harry's lack of subtlety and innovation, he stops reading at once.

"Yet more insipid drivel, I see, Mr. Potter," he hisses with disapproval to the empty room, as if his former student is present to squirm under his critique.

Then, as he's about to crumple the letter and condemn it to the flames, Severus notices something else tucked inside the envelope, resisting his grasp as he starts to crunch it in his palm. He rescues the photograph within, smoothing the edges wrinkled by his assault on it. In the shadows, he can make out the smiles and hand-waving of the Potter family: Harry with his arm around Ginny's shoulders; little Lily—who is, disappointingly, _not_ a likeness of her late paternal grandmother—standing shyly in front of them, grinning hesitantly; young James, eyes squinted mischievously and apparently hiding something behind his back; and, to the far side of James, keeping his distance by a cautious shoulder or so is Albus Severus.

The boy looks slightly harassed and a bit more dour than his older brother, who clearly has some vile form of torment in store for him as soon as the picture-taking is through. Albus Severus' dark hair is rumpled, and there is something introspective about him, a sadness in his eyes… green eyes, his grandmother Lily's eyes. Severus startles at noticing this; it's like peering into the eyes of a ghost, a haunting much more acute than looking at Proserpina, whose eyes are a slightly different shade and shape and whom he knows couldn't possibly a relative of Lily Evans Potter.

Unable to bear staring at the eyes of his namesake—at the eyes identical to the one he's loved so dearly—Severus hurriedly tucks the letter and photograph back into the crinkled envelope. He removes the lid of the wooden box on the mantel and shoves the unwanted correspondence inside as if it's something contemptible, something tainted.

- - -

Severus sees them as he makes his way back to the cottage from the hothouse: Proserpina and the vaguely familiar, tall, messy-haired young man standing by the roadside. Curious and slightly alarmed, he can't help but pause and watch in secrecy from the shadows of the crab apple tree at the side of the cottage. They're laughing, Proserpina looking up at the young man adoringly, her arm linked in his, staring into his eyes—eyes that, Severus is quite sure, are a vibrant shade of green behind the rim of his glasses. The boy draws her nearer to him—says something sweet, Severus guesses, by the blush and bashful smile that crosses his daughter's face. She looks away shyly, but the dark-haired young man, undaunted, reaches out to touch her cheek. His fingertips balance on the edge of her chin, nudging it upward, higher, while he lowers his lips, downward, further. They kiss, her arms suddenly around his neck, his around her waist, two bodies melding into one.

Severus sinks deeper into the shade, embarrassed to watch, to witness this intimate scene. He retreats back into the house quickly, feeling numb and a little betrayed. Certainly, when he started giving Proserpina permission to go into the village on her own last year, he hadn't foreseen this outcome. However, Severus supposes he has known all along that this has been inevitable: Proserpina, like all other children, must grow up sometime, must become an adult—a young woman. And she is a beautiful young woman, which complicates matters even more. And she's kind, her demeanor infinitely more gentle and amiable than most would conceive the likes of Severus Snape capable of cultivating. And she's a clever one, despite the fact that she may have certain limitations in the magical realm…. No, this shouldn't be surprising at all.

Nonetheless, as he resumes his stance at his potions workstation, Severus is distracted, his mind wandering from thoughts of the asphodel roots and wormwood leaves at his fingertips. He can't help but feel stunned, question why Proserpina would lie to him about the boy—it's a lie of omission, of course, but it's deceit just the same. He can't help but wonder if that young man is indeed who he thinks he may be—and, worse, how he'll be able to live with the truth if he is. Further, he can't help but feel a bit more lonely, separated from his daughter, who has been his sole savior and hope for so many years. And, most of all, Severus can't help but be dimly reminded of the hurt and anger that he felt when he found out Lily Evans was engaged to James Potter. It's like being rejected by her—of losing her—all over again.

He wastes no time in questioning Proserpina about the incident. Giving up on his infusion of wormwood, Severus sits by the fireplace, his fingertips pressed together meditatively as he watches the flames, waiting for her to come back inside. When he finally hears the front door open and her light steps on the threshold, he clears his throat loudly, ominously.

"Proserpina Eileen Snape," he says sternly, unable to bear to turn to look at her, "who is that young man I saw you with?"

Admitting to anything but the truth is unfathomable to Proserpina. She's never told her father a lie; she's never wanted to, never seen the need to. Even now, detecting the unmistakable danger riding in the undercurrent of his tone, she can't imagine doing so. "His name is Albus Potter, papa," she replies timidly. "He's a student at Hogwarts. In his final year."

It is as Severus has suspected; the resemblance had been too undeniable to be coincidence. Severus is quiet a long while, dark eyes stony and jaw clenched precariously. Proserpina watches him nervously, surveying his harsh profile, her hands trembling and barely able to bring herself to breathe as she waits for his judgment.

"And how… did you meet?" is all he asks at last in scarcely more than a whisper.

"I… I met him in Hogsmeade this past fall. I was making a delivery to the Apothecary for you, and Albus was there—he'd come from the school on one of their trips to the village…. We've been writing letters and meeting when he's in town ever since." Her voice trembles as she speaks, and she says the last part with especial guilt, as though it is tantamount to betrayal or using an Unforgivable Curse.

"Papa, I'll never see him again if you won't allow it," Proserpina promises quickly, eager to reassure her father of her allegiance to and love for him. She hurries to his side, to sit beside him and take his hand lovingly in hers. "Just say the word and I'll end it with him."

Her words catch Severus off guard. At last, he turns to look at her; there are tears welling in her great, green eyes, and her bottom lip quivers at the thought of having alienated the man whom she knows has given her absolutely everything he's had to give. And the same can be said for Severus: For so many years this docile, devoted, tremulous girl has been his only happiness; causing her pain is inconceivable to him—let alone doing so for his sake. The idea of Proserpina making such a sacrifice for him is revolting to him—an abomination, a horror, something he could never allow.

"No, Proserpina, not at all," he reassures her, patting her hand affectionately over his. Severus' demeanor may have eased and his voice softened, but there is discomfort—sorrow, even—lingering about him. "I want you to be happy."

Relief relaxes her, the worry melting from her face. She squeezes his hand warmly and leans contently against him as they watch the flames of the fire, peace and affection restored between them once more.

"Albus is in Slytherin," Proserpina tells him conversationally after a few quiet moments. "That was your house, wasn't it, papa?"

It takes a second for the awkward, surprised lump which has formed in Severus' throat at this information to subside. "Yes," he confirms when it does. "He must be ambitious, then, Albus. And clever."

He feels Proserpina's head bob against his upper arm in a nod. "He wants to be an Unspeakable, actually," she replies.

"Really?" It's difficult for Severus to mask the fact that he is both taken aback and impressed by such lofty and noteworthy aspirations from any descendant of James Potter.

Oblivious of his feelings on the matter, Proserpina chuckles at his surprise. "Why sound so shocked?"

Her comment is intended to be a rhetorical question, to tease her so-often sour-faced father. Instead, it provokes a twinge of guilt and remorse: In the garden just moments ago, Severus had been disappointed in Proserpina's deceit, in her lies of omission regarding Albus Potter. Only now does he see his hypocrisy. For all her faithfulness to and fondness for him, Severus has told his daughter precious little about the man he had been before her. He has restricted names, places, dates, facts—stripped them down to their bare essentials. Proserpina knows, for instance, that he used to teach at Hogwarts; she knows that he fought in the Wars, though his loyalties remain left to her imagination; and she is vaguely aware of the fact that he has spent the majority of his life recovering—from bad memories, bad habits, and bad love. Severus has always told himself that he has glossed over the details in an effort to protect his daughter from the horrors of the things he has done and seen. In truth, though, he knows he has probably done it more out of fear of losing Proserpina, of her finding him unlovable if only she knew the extent of the man he has been and the things he has done.

"Proserpina," Severus says quietly, "there are some things about… my past… that you do not know."

* * *

_A/N: I gratefully acknowledge that this story is loosely based on George Eliot's _Silas Marner_. To be continued… _


	6. Chapter 6: The Namesake

**The Mourner**

By Daphne Dunham

_A child, more than all other gifts  
__That earth can offer to declining man,  
__Brings hope with it, and forward-looking thoughts.  
_- Wordsworth

* * *

_**Chapter 6: The Namesake**_

_**

* * *

**_

"Oh…!" Proserpina breathes, reaching for the shiny medal wedged carelessly between an old, torn photograph of a smiling red-headed woman and the edge of the box. "Your Order of Merlin."

"You know about it?" Severus is taken aback. Unlike most other recipients of the award, he hasn't been able to bear to look at it and had promptly added it to the ornately carved box the very afternoon Harry Potter brought it to him. He's only had accidental interaction with the medal since—caught a glimpse of it while he shoved an unread letter inside the box to keep it company—or heard it thump heavily, like a dying heart, against the wooden side of the container when he put it back on the mantel.

Proserpina nods and smiles, though, as she turns the medal over in her hand. She reads its inscription with wonderment Severus doesn't feel has been earned. "Severus T. Snape. For valor, wisdom, and skill in the face of danger," she murmurs. She looks up at him brightly, proudly. "Madam Rosmerta told me you were a war hero—but that you didn't like to talk about it. It's true then, isn't it?"

"Hero," Severus replies coldly, "is a gross overstatement." He eyes the medal in his daughter's hand with nothing short of loathing. "…Unless, of course, you consider it heroic to kill the man who was like a father to you, betray the people you called your friends for most your life, and be responsible for the murder of… of someone who had been special to you since childhood."

Proserpina looks at him curiously, green eyes wide and puzzled, as though she doesn't quite know what to make of this new perspective on her father's past. Severus sighs, swallows hard. Then, sinking somberly into his chair, he tells her everything—completely and in dark detail. He tells her about his childhood on Spinner's End, that unhappy home by the river with its shouting and swearing and neglect. He tells her about Lily Evans, that red-haired girl who didn't know she was a witch until she met him and whose smallest smile was enough to make him grateful for everything—from the air that he breathed to the fish and chips wrappings that littered the street. But it somehow wasn't enough to stop him from feeling angry—or from needing to prove himself—or from being fascinated by the Dark Arts and, in his most bitter moment, branding himself to the service of Voldemort.

Severus tells his daughter about the mess of the Prophecy and how it has felt to live daily ever since Lily was killed, how painful it was to watch, teach, and protect her boy day in and day out over the years. He tells her how Harry Potter writes to her still—every Christmas and every summer—and how he keeps his letters, most unopened, in that enchanted, wooden box where he keeps his past safely stored under cover, lock, and key. He mentions Albus Dumbledore, how he protected but also used him, how Severus loved the man but also loathed him, how he was coerced into the headmaster's mercy killing, and how he's only alive today because of him—because of Fawkes. Finally, Severus speaks of the little girl, the toddler with hair of fire and eyes like jade whom he found at his hearth on a cold winter's night fifteen years ago; he tells her what it was like to watch her in Madam Rosmerta's arms, reaching out to him, eyes pleading, begging him to love her. In an odd, other way, it was like Lily all over again, and he couldn't make the same mistake twice.

All the while, Severus observes the change in Proserpina as he speaks: The green light in her eyes flickers, then fades like the aftermath of a Killing Curse to his soul; her grin wilts like an off-season flower; and her fingertips slacken around the medal. Only when she speaks does Severus realize that, to his amazement, her reaction is not one of revulsion, but one of care and concern.

"Papa," she whispers, "how awful that all must have been for you. I-I can't imagine... It seems like too much for one person to bear."

At her words, Severus turns a shade paler, a bit grayer. It _has _been more than he—or anyone, for that matter—should be forced to bear alone, yet he has done it anyway. He's done it because he's had to—because of a lack of other options, because of his fear of the consequences if he doesn't suffer on his own.

"You could have told me, Papa," Proserpina reassures him. "Why didn't you?"

Then, watching the change in her father's face at her words, she suddenly understands. She lets out a small gasp at her epiphany, and—with an accuracy that makes Severus think that perhaps she is capable of Legilimency, Squib though she is—Proserpina accurately offers up his answer to her question: "I will _never_ leave you," she murmurs in rebuttal to his unspoken response. "I want you to know that."

A weak smile forms across Severus' lips, a mingling of relief with astonishment. He can't help but be awed by Proserpina's strength, by her ability to love and accept him even when confronted with the worst within him, about him. It's more than he's ever experienced: Albus Dumbledore, for all his great talk on the power of love, took years to fully trust and believe him, after all—and even Lily Evans, whom he cared for so deeply, whose tolerance and gentleness were so widely admired, set boundaries on her affection, as he so painfully discovered his fifth year at Hogwarts. Looking at his daughter, Severus is overwhelmed with fresh fondness and appreciation for her; looking at his daughter, Severus is overwhelmed with the truth that she is, perhaps, the only person who has ever cared for him as much as he does for her—and that by so doing she has, in essence, saved his life.

"Proserpina, I—" Severus struggles to find the words to express his gratitude to and his love for her, to recognize the unexpected good fortune that befell him that stormy winter's night fifteen years ago when he found her at his hearth. However, declarations of the heart have never been Severus Snape's specialty, and he flounders, face flushed.

Quite used to her father's reserve by now, Proserpina is content enough to nod knowingly, acknowledging the words unsaid between them. She returns his grin. "I know, Papa," she tells him.

With great care and respect, she places the Order of Merlin back in the box resting on her lap, that tomb of torn and crumpled reminders of his past. Then, setting aside the container, Proserpina leans toward her father, placing her arms around him in a comforting embrace. "I love you very much, too," she whispers.

Though slightly stiff—ever unaccustomed to displays of affection, Severus pats her back to return the gesture. "Thank you, Proserpina.… That means… a great deal…." he falters, his voice barely audible.

For a moment as she withdraws, Proserpina thinks she sees the hint of a tear in her father's otherwise hard, dark eyes. He glances away quickly, as though ashamed, and she does the same so as not to prolong his embarrassment.

"May I ask you one more thing, Papa?" she says gently after the color has faded from her father's cheek and they've sat in contemplative silence for a while.

Severus looks slightly pained, uneager to continue discussing his most terrible memories but understanding her curiosity—and right to know the truth—nonetheless. "You may," he agrees.

Proserpina hesitates. "You've mentioned the Potters," she reminds him. "But what role does Albus Potter play in your past?"

Severus sighs. In retelling his tale, it has been easy for him to forget that it was crossing paths with Albus Potter that has prompted their discussion. He peers warily at Proserpina; she deserves a full explanation, and as it seems Albus hasn't told her himself, he sees the task falls to him. "Albus has never told you who his father is, has he?" Severus guesses.

Her chestnut curls sway as she shakes her head. "We haven't spoken much about our families," she admits. "We talk about books—and potions. He's only mentioned that he's very different from the rest of his family—they get on well enough, he says, but he's not quite like them."

Severus nods, recalling the photograph Harry Potter had sent him several Christmases ago. He has never forgotten the seriousness and sullenness in his namesake's face, the way the boy stood out from the others. Severus can certainly intuit how different indeed young Albus must be from the other Potters: the lone Slytherin in a Gryffindor family, a boy who preferred studying to Quidditch, a young man besotted with a Squib despite being raised in such a deeply magical home. It gives Severus an odd sense of satisfaction to think that Harry Potter has sired such an extremely dissimilar son. And in way, he much thinks he might find something to approve of in this Potter boy after all.

"Yes, Albus Potter would be unlike them," Severus agrees. "His father is Harry Potter—_not _something I'd imagine he brags about."

Proserpina looks slightly stunned at the revelation. "He never mentioned…. I had thought that maybe there was some connection, but… but 'Potter' is common enough a name," she gasps.

"Yes," Severus replies, "it's _terribly_ common." It's a sneer intended more for the rest of the Potter clan, than necessarily for Albus himself. "And there's more, Proserpina," he adds, this time without sarcasm.

The idea of there being yet more startling discoveries about her suitor's identity catches Proserpina off guard; her eyes widen, curious, and her head tilts to the side to question her father.

"Albus Potter's full name," Severus tells her slowly, "is Albus Severus Potter. He is named for two Hogwarts headmasters—Albus Dumbledore… and me."

As if to offer proof, Severus reaches for the ornate, wooden box once more. It's the first time in his history of keeping it that he's opened it with the intention of taking anything out. He rifles through the neglected letters until he finds the one he's been searching for. He pulls out the crinkled envelope, the family photograph Harry Potter had sent all those years ago.

"This is your young Albus Severus, Proserpina," he says quietly, straightening the tattered edges of the picture and offering it to her.

With slightly shaking hands, Proserpina reaches for the photograph; she stares at the little boy standing aside from the others, his green eyes and tousled dark hair, the way he looks introspective and intelligent. There is no doubt regarding his identity; the boy is her same Albus. An uncharacteristic pallor washes over Proserpina's face at the revelation.

"I-I didn't know…. Albus didn't tell me—I don't know if he even realizes…." she stammers, bewildered. "I only ever told him that my father was a teacher—not your name or where you taught…."

In the passing moments, the tapestry begins to weave itself together for Proserpina: She forms connections, crosses her father's love for Lily Evans with his guilt for contributing to her death—with his determination to protect her son—and with Harry naming his son after Severus. She understands the power of a name, the meaning behind hers—behind Albus'. She realizes the shock and sting her father must have felt watching her with Albus this afternoon, but she also sees a beauty in her bond with the boy: the two namesakes united, unexpected incarnations of Lily Evans and Severus Snape bound together at long last in love.

"Oh, Papa," Proserpina whispers, looking up from the photograph and wiping a tear from her eye, "you've been so brave…."

- - -

It's Proserpina's idea to go, not his. She thinks it may be good for him to face it—good for her to see, to understand. And she's never been exposed to Muggles—never been outside Hogsmeade or wizarding London, in fact—so it will certainly be a learning experience in that regard as well. Severus is cynical about the entire excursion but agrees to take her; he may be wary of his past, but it _will _bring them full circle, he supposes. Besides, he hasn't been back to Spinner's End in years. He doesn't know if the neighborhood has changed at all—let alone if the old house itself is still standing.

They resolve to leave the next afternoon, an overnight stay—nothing more; Severus can't see the value in staying any longer, in allowing the old wounds to bleed any more than necessary. They pack their bags with Muggle clothes—Severus' unearthed from a dusty trunk in the storage closet, remnants from his years as a professor, when he needed them for his return to Spinner's End on summer holidays—and Proserpina's from a quick stop at The Clothing Exchange in the village earlier that morning. She'd marveled at the racks of Muggle clothes tucked in the back of the shop, the delicate stiletto heels and the short denim skirts—both of which Severus refused to buy her—before settling on a simpler and more conservative array of trousers and shirts. She dresses in one set for the journey, folds the other in her rucksack for tomorrow, and returns downstairs for a cup of tea before they go.

"Albus wrote me back this morning," she tells Severus conversationally as she sits at the kitchen table and fusses with her tea bag.

Severus falters as he crosses the cottage, securing it for the night, closing windows and locking doors. Apparently Albus Potter has wasted no time in replying to the letter Proserpina sent him last night telling him what she's discovered about Severus, about himself. "And?" he asks expectantly.

A shy, slightly self-conscious, rosy hue fills Proserpina's cheeks as she pauses to think about the letter, the parchment covered in Albus' small, slanted writing that had been delivered to her bedroom window just hours ago by one of the school's standard brown owls. She clearly recalls the details of Albus' words, but some parts are better left not relayed to her father, she quickly decides. Like the bit where Albus mentioned how much he cares for her… and how he misses her already—even if he did see her just yesterday… and where he signed his name—for the first time in the months they've known each other—with love. Proserpina smiles as she thinks about this; it's a telling grin that would allow Severus to accurately guess at the letter's remaining contents even if he didn't have an Occlumens' skills to know for sure.

"He said he'd guessed at the connection between you and me, but he's had reservations about asking me about you," she replies. "He doesn't know much himself—and he didn't want to upset me if I didn't know either…."

"Hmm," is all Severus says in reply, pensively, noncommittally, as he resumes fiddling with the locks on the front door. He cannot disapprove of Albus' reluctance to make assumptions regarding Proserpina's surname, after all—especially knowing she's been adopted. Nor can he disapprove of the boy's consideration for her feelings and for Severus' own privacy. In fact, Severus thinks he rather approves of Albus' caution; it exhibits maturity and sensitivity—not to mention Slytherin subtlety. However, his own biases toward the name Potter prevent him from voicing this regard.

"Papa, Albus should be judged on his own merit—not because of who his father is," Proserpina reminds him, a hint of scolding in her tone as she senses Severus' feelings on the matter. She takes another sip of her tea in order to avoid seeing the scowl she's sure is creasing her father's face at her words, then clears her throat to signal the end of their discussion on this topic. There had been more to Albus' letter, of course: He'd told her how he'll be done with his N.E.W.T.s soon—by the end of the week, actually, and how he'll come to Hogsmeade again as soon as he can—over the weekend, on Saturday—when he's through; they have, it seems, much to talk about, after all. Severus, though, doesn't need to know this… not yet, anyway—not when they have Spinner's End ahead of them.

"You'd best get your raincoat on," Severus tells her flatly, also keen to abandon the discussion of Albus Potter and move on with their day.

Grateful for the change in subject, Proserpina stands up with a grin and reaches for the light blue jacket hanging on the rack by the door. It's her favorite addition to her new Muggle wardrobe—its silver buttons that snap and its warm plaid lining; she would have worn it even if it wasn't threatening rain today. "See—I _told_ you I'd need the coat," she tells Severus cheerfully as she peers out the living room window at the ominous clouds, doing up the buttons on the jacket in preparation to leave.

"Yes, yes, you're quite clever—it's an oddity, I know, to think that it might rain in England," Severus replies sardonically as he slips his own coat over his shoulders.

Proserpina smiles at his sarcasm, but as she continues to stare out at the sky, her grin quickly fades. "Look—something's happened up at the school," she says as her gaze becomes fixed on the castle nearby.

Severus steps forward to stand behind her, to peer outside through the clouds and drizzle to the great towers hovering over Hogsmeade. Even from this distance he can make out the distinct change at Hogwarts that has caught Proserpina's eye. Black tapestries are hanging from the windows of the castle; dark bows are woven among the spokes of the wrought-iron fence, and a wreath of coal-colored roses is dangling from the front gate. The signs are unmistakable: The school is in mourning; there has been a death there.

Staring out the window, Severus feels his blood turn cold. The last death at Hogwarts—barring the Battle, of course—had been infamous, had been by his own hand; it had been Albus Dumbledore's death over twenty-five years ago. Bitterly, he turns away from the castle, unable to bear to look at it any longer.

"It is unfortunate," is all he says, suppressing emotion with Occlumens' expertise.

He lifts his arm to Proserpina then, urging her to take it. Her eyes are still fixed sadly on the somber castle when she fits her elbow into the crook of her father's, when she feels the quick jerk behind her navel—feels her body compress and her lungs tighten. She closes her eyes at last to keep from becoming nauseas as they Apparate, and she doesn't open them again until moments later, when she feels her feet thud on solid ground once more.

* * *

_A/N: I gratefully acknowledge that this story is loosely based on George Eliot's _Silas Marner_. To be continued…_


	7. Chapter 7: The End of Spinner's End

**The Mourner**

By Daphne Dunham

_A child, more than all other gifts  
__That earth can offer to declining man,  
__Brings hope with it, and forward-looking thoughts.  
_- Wordsworth

* * *

_**Chapter 7: The End of Spinner's End**_

* * *

A steady rain begins to fall as they make their way through the narrow, cobblestone streets. Proserpina kicks at some litter in her path—a sopping wad of Muggle newsprint. Part of her considers picking it up, turning it over to see how different it is from the _Daily Prophet,_ but Severus is already a few paces ahead of her and she abandons it in order to catch up with him, in order to continue to gape from under her umbrella at the other oddities they encounter. There's the bold brick chimney rising ominously in the distance—and the river, fetid, with amorphous brown foam floating on its ripples—and the buildings, shabby, some boarded closed, others cracked and crumbling, and still others dimly lit with the signs of their impoverished inhabitants. Proserpina has to remind herself not to stare when they pass a dirty man sleeping on a rubbish heap across the street. 

"Did you really grow up here, Papa?" Proserpina breathes, slightly horrified, as she gapes at the postmodern squalor around her, surveying it and tacitly comparing it to the tidiness and antique charm of Hogsmeade that she's been accustomed to.

Before Severus has the chance to confirm, though, a bristling, stray dog emerges from the shadows of an alley, fur matted and growling at them, teeth bared. Startled, Proserpina recoils at the sight of it and watches as Severus raises an arm. The tip of his wand is barely visible under the cuff of his sleeve, and in the next instant, the dog squeals and retreats as a silver spark hits it square in its mangy chest.

"It's changed a bit—_not_ for the better," Severus mutters with contempt as he jams his hands back into his pockets and lowers his hooded head against the rain once more. "But then again, it was never exactly Knightsbridge to begin with."

He hesitates then as they turn a corner, glances undecidedly around as if not quite sure if the street is the same—if the name and landmarks match his memory. The neighborhood has changed a bit indeed; in addition to growing even more derelict, buildings he had once remembered are gone or altered—the Muggle school his mother had considered sending him to prior to Hogwarts has been replaced by a graffitied factory building, and the tiny church—the one his father pretended to attend on Christmas and Easter while he was really sneaking off to the pub—is missing entirely. It's only when Severus spots that infamous pub across the street—still thriving in all its depraved glory, still a spot for brawls and whores, he's sure—that he's sure once again where they are.

"Cor, now _that _is what I call a bit of stuff!" comments a middle aged man loitering under an awning by the pub's entrance as they pass by. A substantial quantity of the man's teeth is missing, and he makes a provocative gesture at his groin as he leers at Proserpina.

"Sod off," Severus snarls in response. His face contorts with rage, and his fingertips itch around the wand in his pocket. It takes a great deal of restraint for him not to grasp the filthy Muggle by the neck and pummel him before hexing his bollocks off; only the threat of violating the Statute of Secrecy keeps him from taking action. Instead, he places his arm protectively around the shoulders of a blushing, humiliated Proserpina and hurriedly steers her away.

"We're not far," Severus reassures his daughter as they continue walking, faster this time. He cannot help but think that he should not have brought Proserpina here; this area is no place for his daughter, and he'll be relieved when they've reached the safety of the old house, such as it is.

By the time they pause in front of a dark residence at the end of a dilapidated row, it feels like they've been walking for hours—turning circles, perhaps. Proserpina's trainers are soaked through, and she shivers as she watches Severus reach into his pocket for the keys, his thin fingers fumbling gracelessly through them in the cold rain until he's found the proper one and—with a click of the lock and a coercive push against the reluctant door—they are inside.

For a moment, they stand in the entrance, dripping on the faded carpet. The house is just as small and unkempt indoors as it appears from the street: near-bare bookshelves lining the walls, tattered furniture, cracked windows, dust. In the curtain-drawn darkness, it has an unmistakable air of gloom, of abandonment—both of which Proserpina knows her father experienced while living here. She steps forward slowly, tentatively, as if walking into a mausoleum, as if standing in the presence of ghosts.

"Pleasant, isn't it?" Severus comments darkly as he hangs their coats on the pegs by the door.

Proserpina doesn't hear him, though: She's already wandering the space, staring at everything, memorizing each chip in the paint and each stain on the floors, trying to picture Severus here as a small boy and as a younger man, as an innocent and as a spy. Severus lets her explore. Instead of following her, he busies himself with drying their things, with trying to make the dreary old rooms a bit more habitable. He raises his wand and sets a rag to dusting—then cracked glass to sealing—and candles to lighting. When he makes his way up the narrow stairs at last, he is surprised to hear a stifled whimpering awaiting him.

"Proserpina?"

She's standing in the cramped bedroom—more of an elaborate closet, really—that he'd had as a child. Disuse and dislike has dictated that the room has stayed very much the same over the years: the bare floors; the thin blankets on the bed; the holes in the curtains; the poster with the Slytherin crest hanging on the wall, a tear across it from one of Tobias Snape's rampages; the tiny desk in the corner, piled high with ink-stained parchment and textbooks, its wooden surface etched in the corner during day-dreaming moments with the letters "L" and "E." It's as if time has stood still here in all its melancholic glory, the remnants telling Severus' story just as clearly as he had only yesterday at Raveloe Cottage when he'd seen Proserpina with Albus Potter.

"It makes me sad to think of you here, Papa," Proserpina whispers as she turns to look at her father standing in the doorway, his silvering hair and the wrinkles by his eyes and mouth, trademarks of his hard life—of his too-many years of suffering. "When I think of what you've given me—and you didn't have half of it yourself… You deserved better than this…."

- - -

They eat take-away fish and chips from the shop around the block that night. It's mostly cold by the time they get back to Spinner's End, and they sit in silence in the living room as they moodily push around the cod in the salt and vinegar. Proserpina falls asleep on the sofa soon after, having spent the remainder of the evening thumbing through a few stray Muggle books remaining on the shelves. Unable to bear to disturb her, Severus covers her with a spare blanket. Then, he sits by the fire and affectionately watches her sleep for a few moments before he returns back up the stairs to the bedrooms, to bed.

Morning rolls over Spinner's End slowly, lazily, in fog and overcast skies. Severus wakes first—to the sound of sirens from Muggle police cars on the back alley that runs behind the house—and after a quick walk to the corner store and back, he has a breakfast of tea and toast waiting for Proserpina by the time she rises, bleary-eyed, from the sofa.

"Seen enough?" he asks her quietly as he watches her poke at a stray drip of marmalade with the half-eaten crust of her bread. He's grateful when she nods, at the indication that she wants to go home.

There is a marked difference in Proserpina today as they venture back through the streets once more, retracing their steps from yesterday: She stares straight ahead, an uncharacteristic coldness in her eyes, apathetic to the sights that had fascinated her just hours ago. A bit of the blissful innocence and naïveté that she'd had just days ago—before learning of her father's past, before seeing it firsthand—is unmistakably gone, never to return. Severus notices the change in her with great sadness; he mourns for it, regrets his contribution to it.

And it's because of this that Severus decides to go back to the old playground—to prove to himself and to Proserpina that his childhood wasn't all neglect and decrepitude, that there was some joy, diversion, and peace. Proserpina's eyes glow with a bit of their usual warmth when he mentions it, and she seems relieved at the prospect. The walk to the playground is considerably more pleasant, more safe, and Severus even catches her smile once or twice as the neighborhoods change, brighten—at the birds in the trees or the flowers planted in the boxes underneath the townhouse windows.

"I think you'll like the playground," Severus tells her. "It's where I met Lily. I have many… fond memories of being there."

As they walk a few blocks further, though, the neighborhoods change once more. Not only have the decrepit tenement houses of the factory district evolved into the neat rows of the more cheerful townhomes, but the tidy townhomes themselves also evolve—this time into the more busy streets and contemporary structures of the business center. On a city block along the border land between these residential and commercial realms, Severus comes to an abrupt halt at last. He stares up at the modern high rise looming above them, seven stories of glass and iron hovering over a tiny but well-manicured lawn. A stone monument by the entrance reads "Lantern Yard Professional Park." Trembling, Severus slumps to his knees before it, running his fingers through his hair, tugging on the lank ends in frustration.

"No…" he murmurs painfully, sounding slightly like an injured deer.

"Papa, what's wrong?" Proserpina asks, slightly panicked by his reaction. She places a hand on his shoulder, stoops to look at him, eye level, as she searches his face for any hint—any clue—regarding the source of his sudden misery.

"It's gone.…" Severus murmurs dazedly. "The playground—it was here… and now it's gone…."

Proserpina gasps; she brings a hand to her mouth to hide her surprise, her disappointment, her pity for him at this revelation. She places her arm around him, holding him, comforting him. Then, recalling the way her father had hesitated at the changes in the factory district the previous evening when they made their way to the house in Spinner's End, she can't help but hope that something similar has occurred here—that Severus has only misremembered the playground's location because of the change in scenery surrounding it—or that they've made a wrong turn on the only vaguely familiar streets when trying to get here.

"Are you sure this is the place?" she asks him, clinging to this hope on his behalf. Proserpina's tone is gentle, cautious, not wishing to imply that her father is mistaken but offering the only likely alternative to the grounds' obliteration nonetheless.

"Quite sure," Severus replies hoarsely. "I spent much time here—so did Lily…. And now it's gone…. Like her."

Together, they stare at the spot where the playground had once stood—the bushes he'd sat by, the swings Lily Evans had played on. They stare at the spot where there had once been trees, flowers, grass—where there had been children playing, laughing—and where a small, neglected boy from the wrong side of town had found an ember of happiness in the kind smile of a red-haired, Muggle-born girl. There's no semblance of any of that here now. Instead, the only happiness on this city block is ignited by the joy of business transactions, of making money—and the only smiles come at the end of the week, when salaries are paid and weekends begin.

"I'm so sorry, Papa," Proserpina whispers sadly, overcome by the tragedy of this transformation. It's another in the long series of disappointments that seem to have defined and characterized her father's life, and she can't bear to see him suffer any longer. "Shall we leave?" she asks him softly after a pause.

Faintly, Severus nods.

- - -

He resolves to sell the house on Spinner's End. It's the one good thing that comes of their trip. There's nothing for him there now; the playground was the last bastion of anything familiar—of anything remotely pleasant, worth hanging onto—but now that it's gone as well, it is more impossible than ever to justify keeping the property, to ever return there again.

"It won't be worth much, of course," Severus tells Proserpina that evening, back in Hogsmeade, as they discuss his decision.

"Maybe not," she agrees, "but knowing that it's no longer a part of who you are _is _worth a great deal, though."

Severus leans forward in his chair; he presses his fingertips together pensively as he stares into the fire and lets the truth of her words wash over him in warm, epiphanic waves. Proserpina is right, and he nods in assent: Spinner's End—with the abuse, neglect, loneliness, and feelings of inadequacy that he endured there—has already done its damage to his life, and although he cannot undo his past, Severus doesn't have to permit it to keep tormenting him as he's done for so long. Indeed, the value of no longer having it perpetually linger in the background of his mind like a recurring nightmare is immeasurable.

"I certainly won't miss it," he concedes.

"Nor will I," admits Proserpina in such a way that they both can't help but exchange wry grins, thinking of the seedy sights neither of them are too keen to revisit any time soon—and grateful that they won't have to.

- - -

"Can I get you anything while I'm in town, Papa?" Proserpina asks him as she tucks the envelope—a letter to Albus Potter ready to post—into a pocket in her robes. She reaches for the faded leather shoulder bag filled with vials of potions and slips its strap over her shoulder.

"Just the delivery to the Apothecary is sufficient," Severus answers from over the steaming cauldron at his workstation. He's about to turn back to stirring the potion as she prepares to leave but thinks better of it. "Proserpina," he says suddenly, halting her as she's about to step away from the table; she looks up at him quickly.

"Yes?"

"Thank you," he adds slowly, placing a hand on her shoulder with a swell of paternal warmth.

Proserpina smiles broadly at Severus. She has the distinct feeling that her father's gratitude is not confined to her mere willingness to run the routine errand to old Master Applewither's for him, but that it is also for so much more—for the comfort, help, love, and support she provides him with. And she has the distinct feeling that when Severus says "thank you" to her, he's really telling her that he loves and supports her as well.

"You're welcome," she replies with a knowing nod as she turns to go. It's a response also intended to communicate more than simple syllables; it's a response intended to reassure him and to acknowledge the subtext of his gesture.

Matters between them have been like this all week—since Albus Potter was spotted on the street by Raveloe Cottage, since the telling of Severus' tale, since the visit to Spinner's End: Father and daughter have coexisted on a new plane of compassion, patience, and understanding. As he refocuses on the potion simmering in the cauldron before him, Severus can't help but feel a strange sense of peace, of liberation. After all, the truths he had feared would divide him from Proserpina have only served to bring them closer together, to further fuse them to one another.

Of course, if there's one thing Severus Snape has learned in his years of living, it's that happiness is always short lived for him: He's simply not a man made for bliss. And about an hour later—as he's just finished tidying up the workstation and while he's still waiting for Proserpina to return home from the village—his sense of calm proves temporary once again.

The knocking on the door startles him. In the sudden shattering of the silence, Severus nearly drops the book he'd just settled into reading. Visitors are rare to the cottage—save for Madam Rosmerta—and it is with great annoyance that he reluctantly draws himself up from his chair to see who is calling unannounced.

Pulling open the front door, Severus is surprised to see the familiar pale, pointed face; shrewd eyes of ice; and slick blond hair. He hasn't seen his godson in twenty-five years—since the night of the Battle of Hogwarts, and for a moment, he can only stare at how the wizard before him has changed in subtle ways—matured—grown from boy to man, complete with a slightly receding hairline, fine wrinkles around the eyes, and a wife at his side. She's a stunning woman, this wife of his—dressed more decadently than practically in sweeping, black silk robes. Her wavy, chestnut colored hair seems to float on the breeze behind her, and her eyes are a watery green—the color of jade; there is something sad, something desperate within them as she peers at him.

"Draco Malfoy," Severus muses as he looks at the pair on his doorstep. It's not much of a welcoming greeting, but then again, he doesn't suppose Draco is any happier to be here than Severus is to see him.

"Snape," Draco returns curtly.

"And to what do I owe the pleasure of your company?" asks the older wizard, a hint of snideness in his tone. Suspicious of Draco's appearance and sensing danger within it, Severus' stance in the doorway is at once imposing, defensive. He folds his arms firmly, authoritatively across his chest as he returns the glare of his long-loathing godson.

"I've come," Draco replies coldly, "for my daughter."

* * *

_A/N: I gratefully acknowledge that this story is loosely based on George Eliot's _Silas Marner_. To be continued…_


	8. Chapter 8: The Squib and the Spy

**The Mourner**

By Daphne Dunham

_A child, more than all other gifts  
__That earth can offer to declining man,  
__Brings hope with it, and forward-looking thoughts.  
_- Wordsworth

* * *

_**Chapter 8: The Squib and the Spy

* * *

**_

Proserpina pauses, hand in mid-reach for the doorknob, when she hears the shouting. Distraught, she stops short, pulls back her hand, recoils. She's never heard her father's voice raised to such a level before, drenched with such resentment… and the other voices—the woman's and the other man's—she does not recognize.

"My father died regretting the years he called you friend—hating you for walking free, for being called a _hero_ while he lived in exile for fear of facing Azkaban if he stayed in Britain," Proserpina hears the unfamiliar man seething.

"Your father could take care of himself, Draco—nothing I did to betray him mattered," Severus lashes back. "Lucius Malfoy would have done the same to me if given the chance—you know that as well as I do. We Slytherins are all alike in that respect."

"And Perdita? What about her?" is the sharp retort. "Does _she_ know the truth about you—does she know you're a murderer?"

"Her name is _Proserpina_—you gave up the right to call her by your name when you abandoned her for being a Squib," snarls Severus. "Just because your son is dead doesn't give you the right to come here and try to reclaim her."

At the mention of her name, Proserpina grows pale, feels her bones quake and her skin frost over. She can't breathe, can't feel her heart beating. All she's aware of is how her mind is swimming, swelling, bloating with thoughts of terror and confusion, with anxious questions and panicked assumptions.

"Stop it, both of you!" Proserpina becomes faintly aware of the woman hissing. "Draco, dragging your father into this _isn't _helping—Lucius wouldn't have had anything to do with Perdita if he'd known she's a Squib. And _you_… as for you, how _dare_ you question my love for my daughter—you cannot even begin to understand how much I have suffered!"

The sound of those words—of hearing this stranger speak to Severus in such a way, lecturing him on suffering when that's all he's done his entire life, telling him what it means to love a child when Proserpina knows very well how devoted her father is to her—is enough to cause Proserpina to take action. She cannot remain silent, an unacknowledged observer of the scene, any longer: It breaks her heart too much to hear Severus face these abuses alone—and for her sake—when she should be there beside him. Proserpina inhales slowly, concertedly, trying to bolster a bravery she does not usually posses. When she reaches for the doorknob once again, her shaky fingers curl decisively around it.

"Papa?"

At the sound of the soft, feminine voice, a hush falls across the room and all eyes turn pointedly in the direction of the sound, in the direction of the doorway, where the hesitant, chestnut-haired teenage girl stands. Severus glances from the Malfoys to Proserpina. Seeing them together, he notices the family resemblance that validates Draco's claim to paternity: Proserpina has her father's heart-shaped face and regal stance—as well as her mother's hair, eyes, and complexion. The moments seem to stretch on for Severus as he gazes at the girl he's called his daughter for so long, as he realizes with great fear and disappointment that the Malfoys' tale is true. Then, in the next instant, he becomes painfully aware once again of time—of the way Demetria Malfoy gasps with a sudden swell of maternal pride at the sight of Proserpina. She appears as though she's about to break free from her husband's side and ambush the girl in all manner of motherly affection.

"Oh, she's so lovely!" Demetria bursts, unable to control herself. "Draco, look at her—look at our little girl! She's all grown up!"

Proserpina whitens further, and her eyes widen. There is something of a startled doe in her demeanor as she glances, confused, from the Malfoys at one side of the room to Severus across from them, seated at the kitchen table. "Papa, what's going on?" she whispers.

"Proserpina," Severus says quietly, darkly, "meet Draco Malfoy, my estranged godson, and his _charming_ wife Demetria."

"Pleasure to meet you," Proserpina tells them, nodding in their respective directions. Her manner is polite but cautious, disapproving and wary of the owners of the cruel voices she had heard upon her entry into the cottage. When she steps forward and crosses the room, it is directly to Severus' side; she stands shyly behind him, peering at the guests over his shoulder.

"Well, _godfather_," Draco begins, his tone dripping with disdain, "do you wish to tell her, or shall I?"

Severus feels his daughter's small hand inquisitively press him on his shoulder, and he can barely bring his eyes to meet hers. When he does, he sees that there's apprehension in Proserpina's eyes—those great, green eyes; she's nervous, frightened, suspicious of what it is she's about to hear, of what she already suspects from the little she heard at the doorway. Severus swallows hard, trying to push past the boulder in his throat. Then, he takes both her hands in his and urges her to sit down beside him. Losing Lily Evans, teaching her son, spying, facing death on a daily basis: They have been the most difficult things he's had to encounter in his life, and telling his daughter the truth about her parentage—risking losing her—will be just as hard.

"Papa, what is it?" Proserpina prompts, searching Severus' face for any clues; she may be frightened, but prolonging the anxiety is even worse.

"The Malfoys, I have just learned, are your natural parents, Proserpina," Severus tells her softly. With a pained sigh, he proceeds to piece together her past from what he's learned from Draco and Demetria; the pair looks on eagerly, nodding periodically in affirmation of his words. Severus tells her how nearly eighteen years ago, twins were born to them, how the boy grew to be a wizard, while the girl—as they found out by hiring some Knockturn Alley outcast to sneak into Hogwarts and check the registry of magical children born that year—was not. He tells Proserpina how the scoundrel the Malfoys had hired was vicious, vindictive—that he was so spiteful as to abduct the little girl in attempt to hold her ransom, and that he died trying to make his escape—Splinched himself in his rush and fury, leaving the child—the Squib—to fend for herself through the cold winter's night.

"I was that little girl," Proserpina murmurs dazedly in conclusion to the story, weaving together the final threads of the tapestry. Stunned, bewildered, she stares ahead—not quite at Severus but slightly past him, to the empty space just over his shoulder. There are tears in her eyes, and her lips tremble at the realization that her own parents didn't want her—not really, anyway. "I was the Squib daughter the Malfoys were ashamed of. It was me who was left alone that winter night and wandered up to your doorstep, into your cottage…."

"Yes, Proserpina," Severus confirms quietly, sadly. "It was you."

For a moment, she is silent, still staring numbly into the distance. Then, she nods, and by so doing, the tears welling in her eyes fall, dripping down her cheeks in solemn streams. She blinks them away hurriedly, trying to dispose of the embarrassment of them any way she can: on the backs of her hands, on the folds of the sleeves of her robes. The tears continue to flood, though, prompting Demetria to step forward with a sympathetic sigh; she reaches out to Proserpina, but quickly withdraws again when she sees the look in Severus' eyes—the stony glare that warns her to keep her distance; her interference is not wanted.

"The Malfoys—your parents—have come for you at _long _last," Severus continues to tell her, adding the latter syllables with great resentment and through clenched teeth. "They want to take you home with them… to France. They're quite wealthy; they can offer you things I can't…. You would be… immensely happy with them." He pauses as Proserpina shifts her focus on him. Their eyes meet, and Severus sighs again as he holds her small hands between his more tightly, more desperately, than before. "You're of age, Proserpina," he adds softly. "The choice is yours to make."

Over the years, Severus Snape has grown accustomed to being shunned, abandoned—even by those whom he cares about. It has become second nature to him to expect to be discarded, and from the moment Draco Malfoy arrived on his doorstep this afternoon, he has felt it inevitable that Proserpina would choose her birth father over him. However, Proserpina's response to the Malfoys' offer is instantaneous, automatic, spoken before she even has time to notice Severus' fear of the possibility of losing her—the uncharacteristic insecurity that hangs in his dark eyes and the way he sits stiffly, full of dread, at the edge of his chair awaiting her answer. And it is because of the immediacy, the urgency, in Proserpina's reply that Severus has no doubt in the genuineness of her decision: He knows she is sincere; he knows it is love, not pity, that ties her to him.

"No, I won't go—I won't leave you," she blurts immediately, with great conviction. Proserpina turns to look up at Draco and Demetria, eyes simultaneously glistening and fierce. "I won't leave him; he's my father."

At once Draco is bristling, Demetria gasping. "I advise you to think carefully about your decision, Perdita," Draco warns vehemently. "A dozen girls your age would leap at the opportunity we're offering you."

"The choice is _hers_, Draco," Severus reminds him sharply. "You can't force her to go with you."

But Demetria has already followed her husband's lead, drowning Severus' words in her own desperate appeal to Proserpina. "Dearest, try to think what you're giving up," she pleads with the girl. "Paris, wealth, luxury, parents who love you—"

Proserpina is not fooled or easily tempted by the mask of affection and the lure of material goods, though. Her skepticism and horror at the Malfoys' return erupts from her in a burst of intense disgust. "Parents who love me?!" she cries. "You abandoned me!"

"We searched for you—we tried—I swear it!" Demetria protests, tears welling in her own eyes as well at the memory of the ordeal and accusations, the strain it placed on her marriage and the lies she told to her family to conceal the truth of what she and Draco had done. "That scoundrel who took you from us Disapparated—we had no way of knowing where he'd gone with you or what had become of you."

"But I may have been dead!" Proserpina sobs. "And you didn't care—just because I'm a Squib—just because you were ashamed of me!"

"_That_ is an untruth!" Draco seethes. "We never gave up on you—we hired investigators to find you. But we had to keep everything quiet—following our association with the Dark Lord during the War, the Malfoys were keen to avoid another scandal. We fled to France; my father—your grandfather—would have been sent to Azkaban if we'd stayed here, for Merlin's sake! Breaking into Hogwarts, parenting a Squib, having a child go missing—society, not to mention the law, would have been merciless; we would have been finished."

Demetria continues then, joining Draco in defense of their actions. "The investigators finally found you—in Hogsmeade, to our surprise, where we had last seen you. We found out that that vile, horrible man who stole you from us had died while making his escape. And you… our little girl… we learned that you were safe—and that Master Snape was taking care of you, loving you like his own child.…" She pauses to wipe a tear from under her eye.

"What we did was wrong, Perdita," Demetria finishes. "I don't deny it, and I only hope you can forgive us. But you must understand, your life would have been _miserable _as a Squib being raised in a family as old and proud and pure as the Malfoys. With Master Snape, you had a chance at happiness. It was best for everyone—especially you—if we let you be. Please, Perdita… please try to see the logic in this."

But Proserpina is unmoved. She stares at her mother, two sets of identical jade eyes locked, transfixed on one another: one pleading—the other hard, unyielding, like stone. When she speaks, it is coldly, in monotone. "Why now?" is all she says. "Why—after all these years—have you come for me?"

The two Malfoys exchange somber, uneasy glances. For a moment, there is silence, heavy like an anvil, and when Demetria finally has the strength to respond, her voice is tremulous, and there are fresh tears in her eyes. "Your brother—your twin, Scorpius…" She chokes back a sob at speaking her son's name. "Scorpius has had an accident—spell damage. He was experimenting, studying for his N.E.W.T.s at Hogwarts. He's a brilliant wizard, your brother…. Sometimes I think that he got the magic you should have had in addition to his own.…" Demetria stops speaking abruptly; she looks up weakly at Draco, hesitant to continue.

Draco gives his wife a reassuring squeeze around her waist. "Your brother died a few days ago, Perdita," he says solemnly, finishing the tale Demetria couldn't bring herself to complete.

Proserpina blinks, stunned. She remembers the somber decorations—the black wreaths and ribbons and tapestries—that she'd seen strewn from the Hogwarts castle windows and gate before they left for Spinner's End earlier that week. They had been, she realizes, for Scorpius Malfoy—for her brother. A piece of Proserpina can't help but feel pity for the Malfoys, for their loss; she even thinks to offer her condolences—or to try to empathize with them. After all, Scorpius—whether she knew him or not—was her flesh and blood, too.

But then Proserpina remembers the reality of her situation, of having been deserted by them—the very people who were meant to love her most. It was _them_ who thieved from her—not _her_ who was thieved from them, as Demetria had claimed: The Malfoys denied her the chance to feel a mother's embrace, to befriend her brother before he died, and to grow up knowing even the simplest things about herself—her name, her birth date, her home. Now, Draco and Demetria have come back for her—their second-choice child—as a last resort, for lack of other options. Comprehending only now the extent of the shallowness and selfishness of her natural parents' actions, Proserpina's loathing for them is renewed.

"So you've come for me now because having a child—even if it's a Squib—is better than having no child at all?" she retorts. "Is that it?"

Demetria blanches, but she does not attempt to deny the truth, to make excuses for herself; she knows it would be futile. "Perdita, darling, _please_—"

"My name is _not _Perdita," the girl hisses in as cruel a tone she can manage. "It's Proserpina."

A furious flush fills Draco's pallid cheeks at being rebuffed by his own daughter. "Your name _is _Perdita Malfoy," he tells her, firmly, "not this foolish Proserpina Snape nonsense."

Severus lurches in his seat at that, instantly eager to defend Proserpina—and his choice in naming her, in the connection her name bears to his past, to Lily Evans, to his mourning and his repentance. At the challenging flicker in Draco's eyes, though, he hesitates: He does not wish to upset his daughter further—and besides, Proserpina is already speaking on their behalf.

"My name is Proserpina Eileen Snape," she seethes. "It's the name given to me by my father when you abandoned me. It's a beautiful name; it's a meaningful name—it commemorates his past. I wouldn't trade my name for any amount of Galleons."

"But _I_ am your natural father—not Severus Snape," Draco protests. "You will use the name _I_ gave you."

"My natural father?" Proserpina bursts indignantly. In an instant, she's on her feet, impassioned. "This man," she says, wrapping her arms affectionately around Severus' neck, "is more my natural father than _you'll _ever be. From the moment he first saw me, he has offered me everything you refused to give me—a comfortable home, clothes, an education, a future, and—beyond all—he's given me love. He didn't care about my bloodline or even that I'm a Squib. He didn't care if I was rich or poor, smart or not. He has given me everything a natural father should give, and he did it all willingly—because he wanted to, not because he had to or because he was being forced to. Severus Snape is my only true father."

Draco's face reddens with rage. His nostrils flare, and his jaw clenches, hard as rock, as he looks from Proserpina to Severus. "Well," he informs the latter contemptuously, "I see that whatever enchantment you've placed on her has been a great success."

Proserpina's eyes narrow to sharp, resentful slits at the implication that it is anything but familial affection that binds her to Severus—and Severus, too, is at once incensed. Before he can lash back at his godson, though, Draco has his wand pulled from his robes, raised on the offensive and aimed menacingly in Severus' direction, poised to dispose of the aging wizard at its owner's will.

"But there are always ways to break enchantments," he spits as jerks back his arm in the beginning motion of a curse.

Severus is on his feet and has his wand drawn in an instant. He stops short, though, when he sees a flash of auburn before him.

"No! Please!" Proserpina shrieks, lunging in front of Severus at once, shielding him from Draco's impending curse with her body and preventing the older wizard from taking action as well. "Don't hurt him—he's suffered enough in life already!" she begs Draco.

For a moment, the room is silent, all within stunned. Time seems to tick by slowly, the clock on the mantel serving as the warden of the awkward moments that pass as they gape at one another. Staring at the back of Proserpina's reddish hair, Severus has an instant in which he thinks of Lily Evans: how she used to come to his defense at school against James Potter—and the way she died for her son, how the last sight Harry Potter must have seen of her would have been so similar to this. It makes Severus' lungs heavy, as though filled with tears, to think of it—to think of Lily—to think of Proserpina's willingness to make a similar sacrifice for him.

And Draco pauses mid-curse, his wand dangling limply at his fingertips, disempowered. He stares quizzically at the pair of them: There's his godfather—his former professor whom he had admired years ago, before the War, before he found out Severus had betrayed every ideal they once shared. And then there's the girl—Proserpina, his daughter, Severus' daughter—so desperate to save the latter's life that she would give her own for him. Then, Draco chuckles, softly at first, then loudly, cruelly, coldly, as he tucks his wand back in his robes. The idea of it is so absurd he cannot help himself: The powerful Severus Snape—the man who has made thousands of Hogwarts students quake fearfully with a simple glance, who had once been among the greatest Potions masters alive, who had managed to outwit the Dark Lord himself for years, who might have had his name known for centuries like Merlin or Flamel or Dumbledore—parenting a mere Squib, producing such loyalty in her that she would willingly enter a magical fray, of which she knows nothing, and die for him.

"So you've really made your choice then, have you?" Draco challenges Proserpina with a smirk once he's calmed.

"Yes," she, emboldened by and indignant at her natural father's mockery, replies without wavering.

Demetria sniffles sorrowfully, but Draco's hauteur prevents from doing anything but remain scornful. "So be it then," he snaps. "Apparently you prefer to live like _this_—" He glances disdainfully around the small, modestly appointed room in clear disapproval—"and to spend your time in the company of – of –" Draco sputters angrily as he glares at Severus, trying to find the right words to describe him, to summarize his loathing for him. "–_traitorous_ _swine_. It's an insult to your ancestors and to your class, but far be it for me to stop you. I wash my hands of you."

At Draco's slur, Proserpina withers a bit, the rosy rush of wrath that had colored her cheeks just moments ago fading once more. Severus can see her trembling, and wand still extended defensively, he stands tall behind her, as strong and steadfast as a gilded sword. He rests a hand on her shoulder to support and protect her—just as she has tried to do for him—and when he speaks, there is a stony, unyielding authority to his tone. He is pitiless as he stares at the Malfoys.

"I will _not _permit you to speak to _my _daughter like this," Severus hisses at them. "You're finished—get out, both of you!"

Now is Draco's turn to wither and blanch: Seeing the senselessness of his presence at last, he complies. Defeated, he pivots sharply on his heel and wraps his arm around his wife. Demetria leans, sobbing, on Draco's shoulder; too distraught to protest any longer, she allows him to escort her away. The shuffle and click of their boots on the wood floor as they stalk across the room reverberates darkly through the otherwise quiet cottage like deadweight, like a dirge.

"You two deserve each other," Draco sneers bitterly, glancing back to look at Severus and Proserpina one last time as his hand lingers on the doorknob. "Both of you filth—the Squib and the spy—each a disgrace to the name of wizard."

And then he's gone.

* * *

_A/N: I gratefully acknowledge that this story is loosely based on George Eliot's _Silas Marner_. To be continued…_


	9. Chapter 9: Chosen

**The Mourner**

By Daphne Dunham

_A child, more than all other gifts  
__That earth can offer to declining man,  
__Brings hope with it, and forward-looking thoughts.  
_- Wordsworth

* * *

_**Chapter 9: Chosen

* * *

**_

She chose him.

From the moment Proserpina showed up on his hearth fifteen years ago, reached for him from Madam Rosmerta's arms to now, rejecting the chance at a privileged life, to finally know her natural parents—she has chosen Severus, has always chosen Severus. And this time, she hasn't done so because of a lack of other options, because she doesn't know any better, or because of some strange twist of fate. Instead, Proserpina has done so by her own free will, with all facts before her and all alternatives—better ones, at that—carefully weighed. She's done so because of want, not need—because she wishesto remain in his life, to be loyal to him, to care for him. Proserpina is irrevocably his daughter now, and Severus can't help but be somewhat astonished, overwhelmed, by her choice: He has, after all, never really been _chosen_ before—not for anything good, anyway—certainly not for love, not for kindness. Trial and torment seem to have always been his lot in life previously. But not now, not any more, not with Proserpina.

Choices are a strange thing. Albus Dumbledore had forever droned on about the power of the decisions once makes. Severus still remembers the way the old man would sit, perched like a phoenix behind his desk, peering meaningfully over the rim of his half-moon spectacles at him, and pontificate. The headmaster would lecture in general on free will, on consequences, on good versus evil and the way each lives in everyone; and then he'd make connections to the matter at hand—from the student who'd decided to skive off classes to Severus' decision to repent his Death Eater days—in particular. Such homilies were merely tolerated by Severus: When dealing with students, he preferred well-crafted detentions to sermons, and he always felt too guilty about his past to make himself out to be a martyr. However, as he looks at Proserpina—_his_ daughter—Severus suddenly feels otherwise. He grasps in a fresh, new way exactly how monumental choices inevitably are, how right Dumbledore had been: Choices are not only intellectual matters, issues of logic or morality, things to be regretted if made badly—as they had seemed to him previously. Instead, choices are personal, beautiful, and capable of bringing hope and comfort.

"Proserpina?"

At the sound of Severus' voice, Proserpina shifts her eyes from the front door she's still staring after and turns toward her father. She appears a bit like fine china—delicate and pale—and her cheeks are still faintly marked by dried tear trails. However, as she looks at Severus, a grin tugs at the corners of her mouth. Severus is relieved to see the light returning to her eyes: She's all right; the Malfoys have been unable to discompose her for long—not when she knows how much Severus cares for her, anyway. "Yes, Papa?" Proserpina replies.

Severus glances toward the fireplace mantel to their left, toward the ornately carved wooden box sitting atop it. When he speaks, his voice is soft, slightly hoarse. "There's something I want you to have," he tells her.

- - -

The low, late-afternoon sun casts a golden-red glow across the floor, across the furniture, across their hands. It makes the lacquer on the wooden box glisten like glass or like water as Severus reaches to take it off the fireplace mantel. Proserpina sits on the sofa and watches her father cross the small space they call their living room and come toward her. There is something slightly different about the way he carries the box: The distaste with which he'd regarded it and its contents just days ago while telling her about his past has abated somewhat. As he takes a seat beside her and balances the container on his knees, Severus is careful with it—gingerly removes the lid, places it on the cushion beside him, and peers inside before proceeding to excavate.

"As you know, I never felt that I quite earned this," he explains as he rifles through the abandoned letters and photographs. "It was more a reminder of the poor choices I'd made when I was younger—when I was your age."

Inside the box, Severus' hand brushes against something hard, metal; he closes his hand around it and withdraws it from the container. When he uncurls his fingers, Proserpina sees that he's holding his medal—his Order of Merlin. It's gleaming in the setting sunlight, the gold glowing boldly, brightly—assuming an almost auburn hue, vaguely like Proserpina's hair.

"Here," Severus says quietly, offering the medal to her; he places it in her palm, curls her fingertips around it. "I want you to keep it. You deserve it more than I do."

For several long moments, Proserpina stares at her father's medal in her hand, the coveted award given only to the most brave, the most admirable, the most remarkable. Looking at it, she feels her heart ready to burst, expanding with affection and appreciation at the significance of Severus' gesture: By presenting Proserpina with the medal, he is not only giving her a piece of himself, passing along the award that she takes pride in him having earned—even if he doesn't. Instead, the gesture extends beyond that; it is as though he is awarding _her_ with the Order of Merlin, recognizing _her_ as the bravest and most remarkable person in his life. And it's true: To Severus, Proserpina—in daring to love and be loyal as she done today, in having chosen him, in her willingness to risk her life for him—has earned this. To Severus, she is more worthy of the Order of Merlin than he is.

"Papa, I…" Proserpina starts to speak but finds no words sufficient to express the amalgam of emotions she's experiencing: She's honored and moved, pleased and grateful. Mostly, though, there is renewed affection and appreciation for Severus, an understanding of how uniquely fierce his love is when he decides to give it and gratitude that it is her whom he's selected to share that powerful affection with.

Still grasping the Order of Merlin in her hand, Proserpina leans forward to wrap her arms around a perpetually stiff, uncomfortable Severus. "I _told _you I will never leave you," she tells him with a grin, "and I meant it."

- - -

Taking advantage of Severus' fleetingly faded antipathy for the wooden box and its contents, Proserpina spends what remains of the afternoon on the sofa, sorting through the stacks of old letters and photographs that she pulls by the handful from it. Beedle-the-cat lounging lazily beside her, she opens envelopes and glances through the aging bits of parchment, piecing together some of the more personal bits of her father's seldom-spoken-of past.

Reading in his armchair by the fireplace, Severus tolerates Proserpina's exploration. In truth, he's so grateful the ordeal with the Malfoys is over—and how it played itself out—that he would have indulged her in virtually any demand she made on him today. Allowing her to satisfy her curiosity about his old letters has seemed a modest request—and one he's run out of excuses to deny.

"Mr. Potter wrote you the day Albus started school," Proserpina, amused, tells Severus conversationally as she scans the contents of one of the letters.

Severus barely glances up from the Potions text he's studying. "Did he?" he says vaguely, clearly disinterested in anything having to do with Harry Potter. "I'm not surprised. Sentimental fool. He always did wear his heart on his sleeve; it was what made him such a lamentable Occlumens."

Unaffected by her father's lingering sourness at the mention of the Potters, Proserpina continues to paraphrase as she reads on. "He says how Albus was Sorted into Slytherin—and that he's proud of him for it."

Unimpressed and unconvinced by the sincerity of Harry's feelings on the matter of his son being a Slytherin, Severus smirks and refocuses his attention on the book in his hands. A skeptical "hmm" is all he says as he turns the page. He's unable to read much more than a paragraph, though, when Proserpina's summarization of the old letter catches his attention once more.

"…Mr. Potter also mentions that he saw the Malfoys at Platform 9 ¾… with their son," she says. Her voice becomes soft then, scarcely more than a murmur. "Scorpius. My brother."

Severus looks up sharply at the mention of the Malfoys. He sees the pallor in his daughter's cheek at the disturbing coincidence of stumbling across the long-ago written notes on her would-be family. For a moment, Proserpina pauses, staring dazedly at Harry Potter's sloped, slanted handwriting. Then, she sets down the letter, trembling slightly. She turns to look pointedly at her father. Crossing the room to sit beside her, Severus reaches for the letter in her lap, a part of him in disbelief at the strange occurrence of its contents. His eyes dart over the surface of the parchment, pausing briefly in surprise at certain words that verify Proserpina's synopsis: _Platform, Draco, Scorpius, also in Slytherin_. It's like looking at ghosts, their images traced on the page.

"It's so strange to think about it," Proserpina muses as he scans the letter. "I would have been there with them—with the Malfoys—if things had been different. Mr. Potter may have mentioned seeing _me_ at King's Cross to you in this letter. And you and I would not have known each other except through Mr. Potter's writing… which you probably would never have read."

With a sigh, Severus sets the letter down again. He opens his mouth to speak but finds his mind a flood of thoughts on the matter—on the Malfoys, on what they have done to Proserpina. They didn't deserve her, he thinks. Indeed, there was one point Demetria Malfoy _was _correct about this afternoon: Proserpina legitimately was better off with Severus. She would have been miserable living with them, growing up around men as arrogant and elitist as Draco and Lucius. Her optimism—her mild, Hufflepuff-like nature—would have been destroyed in their midst. They would have poisoned her, leaving her a hollow, bitter shell of a girl, the antithesis of what she is now.

"The thing about the Malfoys," Severus tells Proserpina, with these thoughts in mind, "is that for all their talk of wealth and class, you're still better than them—you're too…"

Severus pauses. As he looks into Proserpina's face—those great, green eyes eager for his validation—he cannot help but be vaguely reminded of Lily Evans and of all the times he longed to tell her how much he cared—how much he appreciated her—but, for fear and pride, could never quite bring himself to do so. Determined not to repeat his mistakes—just as he had been the night Proserpina reached for him at the Three Broomsticks fifteen years ago—Severus continues. "… You're too kind and good," he finishes.

Then, ever uncomfortable with displays of emotion, Severus leans, body rigid, toward her. Hesitantly, he places a small kiss on the top of Proserpina's curly, chestnut-colored head before adding, somewhat shyly, "I love you, Proserpina."

The words, seldom spoken—though implied daily in gesture and caring, bring a broad smile to the girl's face, and she returns the sentiment. "I couldn't be happier with any other family than with you, Papa," she reassures him.

A rare, reluctant half-grin is teased out of the thin line of Severus' mouth at her words, and the Malfoys seem suddenly far away once more.

"So what are you going to do about all these letters?" Proserpina asks him next, glancing down at the stacks of parchment crossed with Harry Potter's handwriting that lay strewn at her feet, on the end table beside her.

It is with a fair bit of dismay that Severus follows her gaze: As always, he has had no intention of doing anything with the letters—of reading them or of responding to them. He doesn't wish to be reminded of Lily, to give Harry the satisfaction of a mind at ease, or to have to endure ongoing correspondence and the inevitable goodwill that will follow—to be pitied by Harry Potter or to become his charity case, invited to family dinners and holiday parties.

"I believe Mr. Potter will continue to carry on just fine without my input," Severus replies unfeelingly.

Proserpina's disappointment is difficult to miss: Her brows crease and her smile subsides. "But that's not true, Papa," she insists, reaching for a handful of the letters. "Each and everyone one of these letters—" She rifles through them, one after another, as though to prove her point. —"mentions Lily Evans. Mr. Potter only wants to know about his mother. You knew her, and he's been begging you for years to tell him something—anything—about her."

Old grudges are difficult to bury, though, and Severus remains unmoved, lips taut and eyes stony. "Mr. Potter knows Lily died for him—and he knows the hand I had in it," he replies darkly. "That should be sufficient."

"That's not what he wants to know, Papa," Proserpina protests. "And you know that. He wants to learn about who Lily was as a person—the perfume she wore, the music she liked, what made her laugh." Exasperated, she sighs heavily. She can't help but empathize with Harry Potter; she does, after all, know a bit about what it's like to grow up not knowing one's natural parents.

"I understand how Harry Potter feels, Papa," she continues. "Until today, I didn't know my mother either…. Of course, I had you—you cared for me so much that I didn't really wonder a great deal about my birth parents, but Harry didn't even have someone like you in his life. No one loved him growing up…."

Severus' eyes narrow. "And were you pleased with what _you _found out about your parents, Proserpina?" he asks her, knowing full well that what she discovered about the Malfoys today brought her nothing but disappointment and heartbreak. "Some things are better left unsaid, are they not?" he challenges.

But to his amazement, Proserpina shakes her head. "Sometimes not knowing is worse than facing the truth," she explains quietly. After all, if she ever felt inclined to wonder about her natural parents—about her mother, in particular—that desire has now been squelched. For better or worse, having met the Malfoys, she can live without the restlessness now, without feeling as though a piece of her is missing, unexplained. Severus has the power to bring the same calm to Harry Potter, and it is unfortunate, she thinks, that he should refuse to do so—especially after their experiences with Draco and Demetria this afternoon.

Severus is silent, sulky, annoyed by the validity of her argument. Seeing his hesitation, Proserpina takes the opportunity to make her final plea.

"Please, Papa," she says softly, resting her hand affectionately on his forearm—above where his Dark Mark has lain dormant for so long, he notes grimly. "Please write back to Harry Potter. Tell him about his mother—and try to make some sort of peace. It's been long enough, and I think it will do you both good…. And it would mean a lot to Albus and me."

Severus' jaw tenses, and for a few long moments he says nothing. Proserpina watches him nervously, wondering about the dark thoughts hovering like bats in his mind as he stares coldly ahead. She can almost hear the internal battle being waged within him. Certainly, Severus can understand his daughter's motivations for urging him to write back to Harry Potter—the sympathy she must feel for the man who also didn't know his natural parents, the uneasiness she feels associating so closely with Albus Potter knowing the tension that stretches back for years between their parents, the genuine interest she has in seeing her father stop battling his past. But the years—the resentment—the insolence—the mistrust—the fact that Harry is James Potter's son as well... It's all so difficult to forget.

"I'll consider it, Proserpina," Severus says grudgingly at last.

It's the closest thing she'll get to acquiescence for now, Proserpina knows, and she squeezes his arm in fond encouragement. "Thank you, Papa," she tells him. She leans forward to place a small kiss on his cheek, then grins. "Shall I start supper now, then?" she asks, bounding to her feet, her usual amiable nature restored.

Grateful for the change in topic, Severus nods slightly.

Later that evening, though—after the stew has been eaten, the dishes washed, and the leisure time reading by the fire spent—Severus remains downstairs long after Proserpina has wished him goodnight. Only in the solitude of the quiet cottage, accompanied by nothing but the candles and rows of books around the room, is Severus able to bring himself to do it: On a hastily cleared corner of his worktable, he places a blank sheet of parchment; then, drawing a stool beneath him, he sits, hunched over the paper, quill clutched tightly in hand, and begins to write:

_ Harry,  
__First, you should know that just as you named your son for me, so I named my daughter for your mother—and it's  
because of my daughter and your son that I'm writing this to you now. Next, you must understand that I never deluded  
myself into believing that Lily could ever care for me the way she cared for your father…._

Proserpina, hovering at the top of the stairs in her nightgown, secretly watches the shadows move across the walls of the cottage below as her father settles into writing this long-overdue letter, his hand flying across the parchment like a new broomstick. As she listens to the soft, barely audible scratching of the quill against the paper as her father writes, she cannot help but smile. Satisfied, Proserpina turns and goes to bed.

She falls asleep that night still gazing at Severus' Order of Merlin—her Order of Merlin—resting on her bedside table. As she drifts off into dreams, Proserpina cannot help but think: The Malfoys must be back in Paris by now, safely away in another country. And Albus finished his last N.E.W.T. today; he'll visit tomorrow—she's missed him so this week, and they have much to talk about. And Severus, her father—she likes calling him her father—is writing to Harry Potter at last, is putting the past behind him. And he loves her so much, and she knows this now more than ever….

All _will _be well.

_**- The End -

* * *

**_

_A/N: I gratefully acknowledge that this story has been loosely based on George Eliot's _Silas Marner_. Thanks, too, to those who enjoyed the story along the way; the kind messages were much appreciated. And thanks, of course, to JG—who, I'm sure, is glad she'll no longer have to put up with hearing me babble about ideas for this story._


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